


like a lily to water

by serenfire



Series: masks [3]
Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supervillains, Asexual Barry, Asexual Character, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-04
Updated: 2015-05-18
Packaged: 2018-03-28 23:20:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3873685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/serenfire/pseuds/serenfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Barry didn't sleep with Hartley Rathaway, but he did blow up a casino, so he's infinitely more guilty of Iris' wrath.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> @anyone I know irl: do not read thanks

i. 

Barry meets Snart on the street across from the Santini casino. _got info_ , the text had said. Barry had dressed down, the payment in cash stuffed in his pockets. 

(Finally, something good happening after the disaster Saturday.) 

Snart greets him, wearing enough layers to keep his absolute zero gun hidden tucked behind his breast pocket. Alternatively, Barry’s black trench coat sticks to him like a lily to water, exposing the bruising veins on his neck and wrists. It’s a trustworthy gesture. 

“You have the money?” Snart begins without a greeting, just how Barry prefers meetings in the dark. 

He reaches beneath his coat and pulls out the green wads, shoving it into Snart’s greasy palm. 

“The rest of the cash when you tell me what you know,” Barry prompts, hands in his pockets impassively. 

Snark half-leers. “Rathaway taught you well, didn’t he. Heard rumors about you two shacking up, though the way I see it, you’re both using each other to survive, and when you have no use left for him you’ll slit his throat, isn’t that right?” 

Barry frowns. “Our partnership works, unlike yours and Rory’s. Now, the information on the Yellow Flash?” 

“We found large bursts of kinetic energy at Stagg Industries around the time he went missing.” 

Barry raises his eyebrows. “Is that it?” 

Snart sneers. “It’s more than your pretty boy could figure out even with the power of seduction. You going to pay us to keep looking into it?” 

“Of course.” Barry produces the other rolls of green, passing them to the thief. 

“If I’m going to keep poking around Stagg Industries, I need complete freedom to all the resources available in this _fine city_ ,” Snart gestures to the night sky. 

“I can’t help you with that directly,” Barry sighs. “What do you think I pay you unmarked bills for?” 

“No, Allen, I need a little more than just cash this time.” Snart catches Barry by the forearm, his grip unwavering. “I need to ensure that no one hinders me while I gather my resources. I need this whole town on their knees, begging to spill information about Stagg.” 

“The Flash can’t help you with that.” Barry doesn’t blink as he yanks his arm away. 

“You don’t _get_ it. Who currently holds all of Central City’s underground power?” Snart points across the traffic-lidded street to the glazed casino. “The Santini family.” 

“I’m not just another common criminal who can pledge allegiance to the mob for freedom, Snart. My day job is with the police.” 

“You’re still not getting it. Allen, my team doesn’t submit to anyone, not even Santini. We don’t want to ally, but we also don’t want to start a war. I need you to remove them from Central City as soon as possible. Utilize those legs and take the Family to Starling for a while. I’m sure they can find something to do with the Arrow lurking around.” 

Barry frowns and studies the entrance to the casino. Fluorescent neon shines in alternating sequences, too flashy for the sober to behold. Bouncers of a mob bodyguard sort frame the revolving entryway, examining every unsuspecting clubber and gambler that flurries in. 

Barry objectively knows where the Family’s headquarters are, at the back of the casino. He’s seen the blueprints of nice mahogany panelling displayed on CCPD walls. He objectively can see himself dragging Santini into the Arrow’s lair, leaving him to rot for the crimes he’s committed against the homeless. 

Snart notices his uneven breathing, and grins. “Your conscience tries to trick you into believing you’re better than the rest of us that roam the streets. So why don’t you relocate the mob? Do you want to find the man who killed your mother?” 

“If I do this, the job’s all the payment? No bills this time?” Barry asks tersely. 

“Just this. Besides, if you rob banks too often, you’ll get sloppy, and you’ll get caught. Bad for my business.” 

“I’ll do it, if you find me Stagg.” 

Snark nods. Barry wraps his trench coat around himself and glances across traffic. 

“You’re not going to do it now?” the thief raises his eyebrows. 

“If I take him out in the middle of the day, it’ll be easier.” 

Snark’s phone rings, and he detaches himself from the conversation and answers it in one swift motion. “Cold speaking.” 

After a tense second, he frowns and adjusts his watch. “Lisa’s breaking into Iron Heights? _Again_?” 

Snart focuses his attention back to Barry. “If you hear any more of this conversation, I will have to kill you, so _leave_. Text me when the mob’s gone.” 

Barry nods and walks out into the empty street, a red neon stop sign glaring at him with no vehicles to back up its threat. He takes one last look at the Santini casino’s infallible bouncers standing strong and unmoving, and chuckles to himself. 

Someday, all of this will have consequences, but for the moment, his life is wilder than he ever dreamed. 

ii. 

Hartley invites Barry out to the mall, which he’s never done before. 

The sudden text, only two days since the incident, forces Barry to remember that night in the rain, when all he had left was Hartley. 

(Barry grips the counter’s edge, leaning over it and catching his breath. He can still feel the rain in his eyes, in his hair, the panic sparking to life in the moment.) 

He looks down at his phone again and wonders if Hartley gets off on being needed. 

When Barry meets the Rathaway in the mall, the other man has donned sunglasses, walking briskly down the escalator while barking into his phone, and is followed succinctly by several identical men in suits, a stark contrast to Hartley’s own shimmery attire. 

He is also followed by a few paparazzi with professional cameras. 

“Hey,” Barry waves him down and falls into step beside him. Hartley doesn’t glance at him, veering a sharp right and down another shopfront. His bodyguards arrange themselves to let Barry into the fold. “What’s the protection for?” 

“If you haven’t got eyes on the army base, then what’s the use alerting me for?” Hartley is sneering into the phone. “Nothing I can do about it - what did you think, I can hear through military-grade steel? Fuck off, and find a detonator.” 

He hangs up viciously, wiping unseen sweat off his forehead. “Allen, always nice of you to stop by. It’s a nice break from the monotony of henchmen. Never thought I’d need henchmen, but being a celebrity offender, it’s better to keep my hands out of the fun.” 

“You after the army now?” Barry smiles wearily, turning around to glance again at the paparazzi. He didn’t sign up for the tabloids, just a free lunch, maybe. 

Hartley turns into a small shop dedicated to selling lacy, plush pillows, and picks one out at random. “They were after me first, so naturally, I have to retaliate. Is this my color?” 

“If you’re going for a color that fits, maybe it’s best to steer away from the baby pink.” Barry looks Hartley’s manicured green suit up and down. “Definitely best.” 

Hartley pivots on his heel and walks out of the shop, throwing the pillow on the floor behind him. “Of course. You may be surprised to know that the army is tracking the Flash’s activities as well as the Piper’s. I think they consider us cohorts, or something.” 

“That’s rich,” Barry laughs, “but I’m not going to blow up government property and _people_ just for that.” 

“You have no inventions to hide, Allen,” Hartley laughs, and it is the _least_ carefree noise Barry has heard. “All you have is an identity to hide, and a threadbare suit - which I made, by the way - that your _cohorts_ and the press are dearly hoping you will refashion. I think we all want something that screams _lightning_ , like a fractured bolt pattern spiraling down your arms and legs. Wouldn’t that be refreshing?” 

“Did you call me here for anything?” Barry clamps down on his teeth. He can’t look into Hartley’s eyes without seeing the reflection of police sirens. 

Hartley takes Barry’s arm in his and turns another corner. “I hear everything, Allen. For instance, a little bird told me that you may be planning to upset the mafia.” 

“How did you hear _that_?” Barry checked the location over before he arrived - no listening devices within a hundred meters, and no Rathaway in sight. 

“A little bird told me, remember? Keep up. The point is that if you do take out the Santini family, I would like to replace them.” 

“Get in line,” Barry huffs. 

Hartley stops short and his gaze flicks to his bodyguards, who pause as quickly as an echo. He points to a Yamaha store. “Allen, _look_. The cellos are on sale! Let’s buy one.” 

He walks in the dimly lit Yamaha store, taking Barry’s hand in his very firmly, and the bodyguards do not follow them inside. 

As soon as the door closes, Hartley pulls Barry to the floor behind the counter, out of the store windows’ sight. 

Barry’s heart misses a beat in the fear of _whatever the fuck this is_ , and he scrambles back into the corner. 

“What the _fuck_ , Rathaway?” 

“Terribly sorry, but we really can’t have anyone overhear us. My friends are well paid, but they could always betray me to the government.” 

“So it’s better to give me a heart attack? You _know you can’t_ \- and since when is this more secret than blowing up the military?” 

Hartley laughs. “It’s a ruse to seek out the traitors of my henchmen,” he explains. “The military thing.” 

Barry just pulls his hoodie a little lower around his wrists, while his hands resolutely do not shake in an echo of fear. 

“You’re the Flash,” Hartley says, like nothing can truly scare Barry. “If you wanted to bolt, you would be in Keystone by now, feeling completely betrayed by the first person you came out to. I would _never_ make a move on you, Allen, please, I’ve said this before. Except,” Hartley spreads his arms, “it makes a really good cover story. I wonder if the press would eat it up? ‘ _Forensic Scientist of the CCPD and Wanted Criminal Hartley Rathaway TOGETHER?’_ I wonder how Iris would react?” 

“You need to shut up and spit out whatever you wanted to say _in private_ , and the press would never dare.” There goes the free lunch plans. 

“Fine. You want to take out Santini and give the vacuum of power to Snart? He’s so much more megalomaniacal than I am.” 

“I’m not even sure how you heard _that_ , but if you did, then you know that they can discover who my mother’s killer is. Why shouldn’t I trust them with that power?” 

“I’m not saying you shouldn’t pursue your dreams of avenging your mother, but if I was to be there at the exact time of the Santini disappearance, I could clear up some misunderstandings about the Flash’s involvement in the plan and at the same time assert my dominance over the underworld.” 

“And Snart?” 

“I wouldn’t get in his way. After all, my speciality is music and Hertz and at what frequency can kill people. I don’t deal in kinetics.” 

Barry looks away from Hartley to the music store’s counter filled with spare cork grease and reeds, neatly piled. Hartley leans back from Barry, running a hand through his perfectly styled hair. 

“So if you were just to show up at the time of the Santini’s mysterious disappearance, then you would take all the credit? You would be the _public_ face of the new crime world? You, the Hartley Rathaway, would take that risk?” 

Hartley smiles. “I am fully prepared to take on bigger reins than what my current status allows me.” 

Barry breathes into his hands, counting his heartbeats. “It makes sense, I guess. I don’t want the Flash to be responsible.” 

“It’s mutually beneficial.” Hartley spreads his arms. “Besides, I’m the only one who can be an adequate replacement for Central City’s mafia, admit it.” 

“Okay,” Barry nods. His heartbeat is mildly under control. “Sure. Let’s do it together. Why not?” 

Hartley smiles and stands, grabbing a few of the instrument reeds from behind the store counter. “You know how much these cost, Allen? They’re like platinum, but from trees.” 

Barry moves to walk out into the general public’s view, but Hartley stops him. “We have to sell the story, you know, so they don’t suspect we were plotting.” 

Barry backs up. “ _No_.” His heartbeat jumps off the deep end. 

“I just need to mess up your hair a bit.” Hartley runs a gloved hand through Barry’s hair, and it looks no more unruly than before. “Your hair is a menace.” 

Barry returns the favor by throwing Hartley’s coif off kilter. “Yours works fine.” 

Hartley unbuttons the top button of his shirt, and motions to Barry’s hoodie. “You have to take that off.” 

“ _Why_?” 

“What’s worse for everyone to think, that my bodyguards stood outside a Yamaha for us to _plan_ , or for us to fuck? Take off the hoodie, Allen.” 

“You could have come up with a better plan. We could _actually be buying a cello_ , and not stealing reeds from the counter.” 

“Yes, well, my guards have been through this routine several times already this month. It’s easier than changing the plan on the spot.” 

Barry sheds his hoodie, bunching it around his arms so that the cold air on his mottled bruises don’t cause excessive shaking. Hartley whistles. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say those were hickies. Sorry for your apparent pain, but the bruises will work in our favor.” 

Barry looks down the examine the harsh, purpling smudges covering his arms, poking out from under his T shirt. “You see why I wanted to keep on the hoodie?” 

“Too late now. Time to go!” Hartley pulls him out from under the counter, plastering on his best fake giddy smile as he opens the door blocked by bodyguards. They fall out of the way for the Rathaway as he straightens up and the camera flashes begin to fire. 

Hartley throws one arm in front of his eyes as he drags Barry out by his sleeve, throwing shit-eating grins and flipping off every reporter. “That’s for invading my privacy!” he screams at the masses of people who had gathered to see exactly why a store selling cellos for forty percent off needs guards posted in front of it. 

Barry squeezes his eyes shut and wishes so desperately he can take Hartley and run to a deserted street or a warehouse or _somewhere_ that a hundred people didn’t think he and the _Wanted Criminal Rathaway_ had been fucking. 

There was no way he could keep this from Eddie. 

_One step closer to avenging my mom,_ he thinks amidst the spots seared into his retinae. 

iii. 

The Santini casino goes up in flames as Hartley Rathaway stands in the middle, arms raised, sound waves radiating off of his gloves, giggling. Gamblers huddle against the walls, tables and arcade machines overturned and littering the floor. Wallpaper tears, and the door to the private rooms to the back has been ripped off. 

The Flash appears back in a bolt of lightning, standing tall in his suit and talking on his cell. From behind him, one terrified bystander pulls out her phone and begins to film their interaction. 

Hartley pulls the Flash into a hug, still laughing. “It’s mine,” he breathes, and turns back to the wary Santini henchmen who have their handguns out and all trained on Hartley’s heart. “Oh, just _relax_ ,” he smiles, and with a wave their guns all crumple in on themselves, Hertz bouncing off at an indecipherable level. 

“Did you hear me?” Hartley shouts again, leaping up onto a pool table and spreading his green gloved arms. “It’s all mine! If there is no one left to challenge me, I will take up this mantle. There’s so much sound that Central City has left to hear.” 

“I challenge you,” comes a voice steely with intent from the revolving doorway. Hartley turns to see Captain Cold standing slack, his gun pointed straight at Hartley’s head. “This was promised to me.” 

The Flash darts over to Cold and wrests the gun out of his hands. “We have an agreement,” he hisses. “You’ll get your freedom with Stagg Industries.” 

“I didn’t want this position _just for_ the investigation, Flash.” Cold swings a punch at the red-cloaked face and grabs his gun back. “Now stand aside, or freeze.” 

The Flash reaches for the gun again, an aborted movement, and then backs up. 

Hartley cracks his neck and juts his chin at Snart. “What power do you think you have to back up your claim, _Captain Cold_?” he jeers. “Unless you think your weapon is impervious to sound waves.” He waves his hand, and the gun shatters down the middle. 

Cold drops it, sneering. “ _Fuck_ , now I’ll have to get the Ramon kid to replace it. Oh, Rathaway, you think I have no power now? What kind of mob boss would I be if I forgot my henchmen?” 

The revolving door behind him is consumed in flames, and from them steps two figures in dark leather. The one with flowing hair shoots her gun with military precision at Hartley’s left glove, and it solidifies into gold. 

Hartley ducks the next shot, rolling behind an upturned arcade game. A loud “ _Fuck!_ ” can be heard as the gold glove goes flying into pieces, and he whirls around and aims his working glove at the girl’s gold gun. 

The other man fires his gun at Hartley, and a stream of fire shoots out. Hartley swears again and shouts for backup. Instantly, several identical men in suits and sunglasses burst out from the back room, firing handguns in the direction of Captain Cold and crew. 

The Flash carried people out of the way three at a time, depositing them outside the casino doors. “Leave,” he hisses, and they all do, except for the one woman with her phone, still recording. 

“You’re destroying Central City,” she says. 

“This wasn’t my intention,” the Flash bites back. “Please. Whatever you do with _that_ , please let them know I didn’t mean for this to happen.” 

“What, did you think yourself some kind of vigilante?” 

The Flash glares at her, and an involuntary shiver goes through his frame. “ _Never_ ,” he grits his teeth, “but that doesn’t mean I can’t try.” 

Behind them, the casino goes up in flames and shatters the glass in the entryway. The Flash doesn’t even flinch, just races back into the burning building. 

iv. 

“In shocking news today, our ‘beloved’ Santini casino exploded,” Iris West explains to the camera, her unfettered shock completely exposed. “Because of a video that went viral only minutes after its posting on the Web, we now know that the Flash, the Piper, and Cold’s crew - frequently referred to as the Rogues - were all involved. Since the explosion, firefighters have been working around the clock to save any traces of indicating exactly what happened inside. 

“I am here at the former casino now.” Iris swivels the camera so the Internet audience can see the smoking wreckage and the full-suited firefighters carrying thick hoses in and out of the doorway. She is far enough away from the scene of the crime that the smoke hasn’t reached her. 

“Excuse me, firefighter?” she flags down a man hollering directions to others in front of a fire truck. The man looks at her, eyes flashing to the camera. “Can I ask you a few questions?” 

“You aren’t a reporter,” he notes. 

“That’s correct. I am a freelance journalist. May I ask how many casualties you think have resulted from this?” 

“We haven’t found any bodies yet, but there is significant rubble in the main room,” he says. “It’s not completely impossible that there may not be any casualties, though.” 

Iris redirects her attention to the camera. “According to the video evidence that recently turned viral, it may be the Flash’s doing that the bystanders got to safety before the building blew. However, it may also be the Flash we have to thank for this act of terror, even though, and I quote, he did not mean for it to happen.” 

Sirens are heard off camera, and Iris looks in their direction. “Looks like the police have arrived. Since they are infamously known for getting in the way of my investigation, looks like I should sign off for now. This is Iris West, reporting almost live from Central City. Thanks, Internet.” 


	2. Chapter 2

v. 

Joe West vaults out of his car, head still turned to the ongoing argument inside. Barry Allen steps out from the passenger seat, slamming the door shut. 

“How did you _not know_ this was going to happen, Allen, since you’ve been spending every spare moment with Rathaway ever since Saturday night?” 

“That’s _not what happened_!” Barry hisses back, shoulders quaking in unspoken anger and justice, fists curled within his red hoodie’s pockets. He’s not talking about the casino. “We’re acquaintances, and we aren’t _together_!” 

“I saw a very clear picture on the front of the Picture News that says differently. I feel like you should have told me about this.” 

“I didn’t know this was going to happen,” Barry screams, blinking tears away and staring, jaw moving, at the gravel. “But maybe I can figure out what did happen here, if you let me do my _job_!” 

“We’ve gone through this. You’re too close to this case, and you need to go back to the Precinct.” 

“I’m here to help people!” Barry’s voice cracks as he stands with locked knees a few feet away from the Detective. “I can’t fight crime like you do. I don’t have a gun. I didn’t have forewarning. But I _know_ how to analyze fire. You don’t have any better analyst who can distinguish the remains.” 

West notices Eddie Thawne jogging to them, jaw clenched, and nods in his direction. Barry spins around, and his face clenches up further. 

“Detective,” West says brightly. “Actually, since I have both of you here, would you be willing to give statements on what happened with the robbery at the restaurant?” 

Barry’s hand subconsciously reaches for the scrape on his back, almost a white line by now. “No,” he grits his teeth. “After all, don’t I have to _go back to the Precinct_?” 

Eddie shifts his attention to Barry and shuffles a piece of torn newspaper out of his pocket, shoving it in Barry’s face, and pushing him out of Joe’s hearing range. “I Googled after the incident. I thought you were asexual, or sex-repulsed. I _respected_ that, and worked up the fucking courage to ask you back. And then I find out _right before_ being called to go to the blown up mafia casino that you weren’t even - that you just don’t _like_ me, I guess.” 

“That isn’t what happened.” Barry’s so _exhausted_ from Hartley’s disguises and the press that Hartley attracts. He needs to keep Eddie, has needed him as a boyfriend ever since Barry realized the detective had been eye-fucking him when they were in the same room together. 

If he doesn’t have an in on the CCPD’s not-monitored-by-police-radio movements, the Flash will get caught. 

He reminds himself of this, calmly, and speaks again. “Eddie. I liked you. Like you. Please. I _am_ \- you were _right_ -” Barry reaches out with an open fist, and pulls it back again before he can complete the movement. 

Eddie stares, unmoving, at the scene before him. 

“We didn’t do it. I swear. _And_ Hartley didn’t tell me that he was about to take the Santini family. I know it looks terrible, but he was literally the only person I trusted after the restaurant. I guess he didn’t trust me as much to keep him alive.” Barry knows tears are dripping from his eyes, and he can’t really bring himself to care. 

“And why, exactly, would I believe you?” _Please find a way to tell me every ounce of common sense I have is wrong._

“Joe’s under the impression I had something to do with _this_ as well. He won’t let me stay to analyze,” Barry whispers, changing the subject because he _can’t prove it_. “He’s sending me back to the Precinct, probably to drill me about the newspaper later.” 

“You need to rest,” Eddie says. “Just skip it and go home. We can talk later.” 

This time, Eddie uttering the word _home_ doesn’t send a cold chill up Barry’s spine. (He’s not sure he can feel anything after massive smoke inhalation.) 

From behind them, Joe greets Iris loudly with a cautious, “Hey, Iris.” 

Barry cranes his neck on instinct to see Iris glaring at him with unadulterated hate in her eyes. He backs up against the car. “Whatever you think, Iris, I _swear_ -” 

“You slept with Hartley Rathaway, the fucking criminal known for picking up any twink with a pulse, and you don’t even _like_ sex so you had to be making a point, and Eddie still cares about you? What did _you_ do to deserve that?” 

She punches Barry in the face. The worst part is Barry _knows_ the punch is coming. He can _see_ it, and rolls his eyes into his head to brace for impact. He deserves it, doesn’t he? Barry didn’t sleep with Hartley Rathaway, but he did blow up a casino, so he’s infinitely more guilty of Iris’ wrath. 

(It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Santini out, Rathaway in, Snart free but not opposing anyone.) 

So Barry lets her knuckles collide with his cheekbone, and he lets himself fall back into a heap on the gravel, spitting out rocks and brushing the sting off his palms. He spits blood onto his matching hoodie, and Eddie hauls him back up. 

Joe is wrestling Iris away from him, and Iris is more subdued. She just breathes unsteadily, her glare at Barry more angry than he ever remembered her. 

Joe turns to Eddie. “I’m taking Barry home,” he says. “Detective, you’re in temporary charge of this investigation.” 

“Done,” Eddie nods, and strides past Iris without looking at her. Joe hustles Barry back into the cop car, and Barry’s eyes are still tightly closed. 

vi. 

Joe questions Barry gently on the way to Barry’s apartment, trapped in Central City midday traffic. 

“We were just talking,” Barry says, curled up in the passenger’s seat with his feet against the dashboard. 

Joe notices and says, “Quit that. You’re not ten, Allen.” 

Barry huffs out a laugh but doesn’t remove his legs. He can’t risk Joe seeing how his calves shake and don’t respond to stimuli. He can’t risk Joe absentmindedly patting his knee and noting how mottled the flesh seems. 

(He’s almost sure there was no one left in the Santini casino by the time the roof imploded, after almost one minute of continual fire. Hartley had left the gold-turned sonic glove in pieces, but the actual Piper himself was nowhere to be found. If he’s anything like the parasite Barry knows, he’s still alive.) 

“So,” Joe prompts. “Rathaway?” 

“He said we needed to put on a show for the press, and I was kind of drunk, so I agreed.” Barry stares resolutely out the car window so Joe can’t see his tell, the tick of his eyebrows when he lies. 

He looks at sliding buildings, all marble and concrete, none of them on fire. All of them in danger of being set on fire if Snart and Hartley decide to raise their feud to the next level. 

“That’s it? You were drunk, so you pretended to hook up?” 

Barry nods. “I didn’t know he was going to start a war with Snart.” 

“Wait, so Rathaway would still have been drunk when he took the Santini family god knows where?” Joe frowns. 

Barry twitches his eyebrow again. “I guess so.” 

“He definitely has a commanding presence under the influence.” 

Barry really wouldn’t know if he did. 

Joe pulls up in front of Barry’s apartment, and pats him on the arm as Barry disentangles himself from the dashboard. “Take care of yourself, okay? _Rest_. Come back tomorrow and analyze the samples of the wreckage in your lab.” 

“Got it,” Barry smiles wearily, and leaves the car. 

He opens his apartment door to see Hartley Rathaway sprawled on his sofa, an ice pack over one eye and wearing Barry’s bathrobe. Hartley cranes his neck over the sofa to see Barry, and motions for him to shut the door. 

Barry does, and hurries to sit on the sofa across from him. “Are you okay?” 

“Are you _worried_ about me, Allen?” Hartley coughs. “Don’t waste your breath, I’ve never been _better_ with second degree burns on my arms. Of course, I wouldn’t expect you’re well off either.” 

“You’re still alive,” Barry says. 

“I am aware of this, in fact. Speaking of burns, as you fraternized with the police you probably haven’t addressed your own. I’ve got extra ice here.” Hartley toes the tupperware of ice at the foot of the sofa. 

Barry hesitates and then pulls his hoodie and T shirt over his head. Hartley whistles, gaze taking in the previous bruises and the raised, swollen spots on his arms and pecs. “You are one skinny son of a bitch, Allen. Take all the ice you need.” 

Barry grunts in affirmation, and wriggles into a horizontal position on the sofa so that his feet are by Hartley’s head, and begins pouring ice onto his chest. 

Hartley arranges the ice pack over his eye. 

“What are we going to do now?” Barry breathes. 

“Well, I have an underground to manage and a parole officer to meet with in an hour to convince none of today involved _me_. You have a job to do that erases all evidence of the Flash being involved, as well.” 

“I didn’t mean for any of this to happen.” 

“God, Allen, _none of us did_. I didn’t want to be squatting in your place because my penthouse is being monitored. There are probably people interested in getting a scoop on my ‘latest romance’ watching this place, but I took a shortcut through the sewers to get here. Then like, I showered, so it’s fine.” 

At the mention of the press, Barry scowls. “Why _are_ you here, Rathaway?” 

“I got nowhere else to go, Allen. You have spectacular water pressure, by the way. If I have to start squatting here, well, it’s not so much of a terrible thing.” 

“I thought you were here for my - _ahhh_ \- wonderful company,” Barry yawns. 

Hartley sits up and looks at the younger man, squinting. “You need to sleep, Allen. Helps with the burns.” 

“What if - _ahhhh_ \- Snart shows up?” 

“I’ll pretend nobody’s home. You forget, I didn’t mean for any of this to happen either.” 

“But you have so much to gain from it.” 

“Sure, but I have seven back-up plans in case this doesn’t come through. _You_ have nothing to gain from a full-out Piper-Rogues war.” 

Barry is silent for a moment. “Remember when we first met, and you knocked me out?” 

“How would I ever forget? Had to cross-reference the face pic of you asleep in the alleyway with the CCPD database to get a name, which didn’t work _at all_.” 

“Why are we a team, then?” 

Hartley reaches over and pats Barry’s ankle. “You’ll figure it out.” 

vii. 

**2.00 AM**

A man with greased hair leans against an alley wall, the thump of club music reverberating throughout the space. His suit is especially crumpled tonight, and his eyes are more bloodshot than usual. He phones an unsaved number, and all that returns to him is the patient ring of a home phone. 

It picks up with a contained click. 

“Sir,” he says gratefully, shifting his posture to a more wary stance. “I have eyes on Rathaway.” 

In fact, he can see Rathaway’s full profile, standing in front of the apartment’s open window in nothing but an undershirt, normal hair unruly and a burner phone stuck to his ear. His glasses are dangling on his fingers, and a cigarette hangs out of his mouth, curling smoke. 

“Good.” Leonard Snart’s voice echoes, tinny and distorted from his phone. “Plans are almost in place to seize all of Santini’s assets. It will be only a few minutes before I give the order.” 

The man relaxes again, taking his hand off the revolver in his belt. “Am I shooting to kill?” 

“I don’t know, do you want to?” 

“I don’t necessarily _want_ to shoot one of the richest men in the city,” the man bites his lip. “But I’ll do it. Should I kill him?” 

“Surprise me. It doesn’t really matter, anyway. Once we have what we need, Rathaway can’t bother us. Once we reveal all of Rathaway’s crimes to the public, he’ll have no choice but to run. I suppose he won’t even have that choice if he’s already dead.” 

“So do we want him humiliated or in a puddle of his own blood?” 

“Like I said,” Snart grins, “your choice. Now, shut up, I have to finalize an inventory of Rathaway’s vault.” 

**1.55 AM**

Hartley leans out of Barry’s window, looking listlessly at the gray walls of the apartment building across from him. Laundry strings cross from balcony to balcony, and lights are on in most kitchens, illuminating faces of preoccupied people who have insomnia, or a nightmare, or just can’t go to sleep. 

_Just like college,_ he remembers with a smile to his teeth. Just like waking up with a fuzzy head and a sluggish heart, just like thinking what his parents would say if they saw him like this - always guaranteed to speed up his heartbeat into unmanageable levels. 

Hartley lights a lone cigarette lying in his pocket, and blows lopsided smoke pillars into the frigid air. He knows for a _fact_ that Barry has a pack of Marlboros in his kitchen drawer, with two missing from the package, and that makes Barry all the more human. 

God. His head’s swimming from the adrenaline crash and the slight glitching in his hearing aids from the explosion. If he tries to extend his hearing to anything beyond normal, the world is engulfed in static. Hartley knocks on the cement windowsill and feels the reverberations beneath his scabbed knuckles. 

Hartley reaches and takes off one hearing aid, detaching it from the permanent blister behind his ear. There’s a sudden impulse to pull it all out, to break the cord around his eardrum with sheer force of will, to sever his link with sanity. To feel the pain again, the pain he escaped only twelve hours ago. 

(He deserves it, doesn’t he?) 

It comes back to him. The heat of the moment. Shattering his useless glove into bits. A wildly insane heartbeat reminding him he’s going to freeze or burn to death, that there is no other choice. 

There is still no other choice. 

He has declared war. 

Hartley pulls out his phone with a shaking hand, pressing it against his ear. The one number he hasn’t called in years, still on speed dial, currently ringing. Hartley can feel the sound more than he can hear it. 

The click of voicemail tells him in his mother’s pleasant, impersonal voice to leave a message. Hartley bends over the windowsill, the back of his other hand pressed against his mouth. He can’t do this. He has to do this. 

“Mom,” he says, taking in a deep breath. “Look, you’re probably wondering why I called. You’re probably still awake, just listening to this voicemail while I’m saying it, because you can’t deal with me. I still hate you too, don’t worry.” 

(Does he? Hartley hates uncultured clothing and undergrad students who think they’re superior to everyone else. He hates the police force for their opposition to his goals and he hates fucking Harrison Wells for ignoring his advice, kicking him out, and threatening a court case right after Hartley lost his family’s lawyers. He hates his amplified hearing, the dysfunctional sense that had calmed him down after is panic attacks. He hates the scars on his wrist, the way people who shake his hand too carelessly notice the keloid line. Hartley hates the way his parents’ friends used to say his name, to spite the _position_ it held. Hartley hates the way the dead bodies lolled when he first tried to use his sonic gloves, and the way they _screamed_ before the waves hit them.) 

“Look,” he continues, even more unshaken, “I did something terrible. I’m sure you’ve read about it in the news by now. I’m sure the police are monitoring your number; that’s why I called. I just want to say I didn’t do it, but I did unknowingly help facilitate it. So I _will not_ take the blame for the casino’s destruction, but I want everyone on this line to know that I will go after the bastard that did it.” 

Hartley takes off his glasses so they don’t fall for stories and shatter like the omen about breaking mirrors. He sets them down on the sill, hand shaking violently. 

“Look,” he says again. “I’m going to get the man that did this. I almost died, if you care to know, but I heal fast. So I’m fine. I might start a mob war, though. So don’t go out after dark, okay? Shit. Just be safe. Do that for me.” 

Hartley rests his head in his hands. “I know you don’t care if I die or not, but fuck. _I_ do. Tell your lawyers to prepare for war against the CCPD, because they’ll probably charge you with being an accomplice or something. And while you do so, _I_ will prepare for war against literally everyone else.” 

His legs collapse, and he sits on the floor, pressed against the cold cement and feeling the wind over his body. “I met someone, I think. He’s great. He’s not interested in me. You don’t care.” 

The voicemail beeps, and Hartley breathes into his hand. In for five seconds and out for four. One less thing to worry about, whether or not his parents would permanently visit Iron Heights. Hartley supposed if they did that it would be easier to arrange a meeting that they couldn’t avoid (in an alternate world where he wouldn’t be arrested stepping into the place). 

Hartley dials another number, the one of a pay phone in the middle of a park at the outskirts at the city. It picks up on the second ring. “Do it,” Hartley says, eyes squeezed shut. “Do it, _do it_ , right now.” 

“Are you certain?” the clipped voice asks. 

“I don’t really care about subtlety anymore. _Fuck_. This was supposed to make it so that I didn’t have to run for my life, but here we are.” 

“If you do this, you’ll never stop running.” 

“It’s the first move in the chess game of life. I have to take it. The building’s completely empty, correct?” 

“Yes.” 

“Then _fire_ , for fuck’s sake. I’m the new boss in town, and the Rogues are just going to have to deal with it.” 

“And Barry Allen, sir? What about his opinion of you?” 

Hartley cranes his neck to see Barry still draped over his couch with a quilt pulled up to his neck, snoring softly. He smiles in spite of himself. “He’ll think it’s Snart, if you’re sure no one can trace this call.” 

“I’m sure, sir.” 

“Good. Now do it.” Hartley hangs up, watching the screen as it flicks to sleep. He closes his eyes again, and hears with the back of his head the sound of another explosion, triggered in the middle of Central City. 

He almost misses the sound of a shot being fired over his head, and a dart sticking to the cement of the wall. Almost. 

“Look out!” he screams at Barry, too late to react but early enough to watch the dart explode. 

All he can think is _Well, now they’re_ sure _to think Snart did it. What’s the use of hidden bodyguards if I die?_

Hartley blacks out as the fire reaches him, just as a figure still wrapped in a quilt picks him up and carries him out of the apartment. 

**2.15 AM**

Barry sets Hartley down on the corner of the street, examining his face for any sign that the fire had reached him. He turns and races back up to his apartment, looking around wildly for any sign of the cause. 

He had only registered Hartley’s shout and the gut reaction to _protect him_ , to get him to safety. 

(Since when did Hartley mean more to him than anyone else?) 

(Since about the time Barry got shot in the back by a restaurant robber.) 

There’s nothing left in his apartment except burning smoke and the initial explosion fading. Barry zips through the house checking for signs of a bomb or a spark, but can only find a ring of intense char where the fire had started. Barry grabs his wallet, protected from the initial blast of intense heat from its position under the sofa, and a hoodie from his closet. The hoodie disintegrates in his hand, so he counts it as a failure and leaves again. 

Hartley’s awake, just barely breathing, shallow gasps of air with a focus that betrays the fact that he’s in immense pain. Hartley brings bleeding hands up to his ears, feels nothing around them, and grits his teeth down as the pain engulfs his head. 

Not like the disorientation after the first fire in the casino. Hartley doesn’t remember pain like this since the particle accelerator explosion, when his regular hearing aids disintegrated and his eardrums were blasted with matter. 

He hears the loll of a few crooning birds, the swish of gutter water under his body, the indecipherable wind rattling metal stop signs, the crash of a book dropped on the ground twenty floors above him, the mechanical and audible sound of a cell phone snapping pictures in a cha-cha-cha formation, the wail of a baby frightened, the chant of “Oh, _god_ ,” over and over again complimenting it, the sound of palms slapping Hartley’s face, Barry’s voice, “ _Wake up, please wake up_ ,” rolling hills of fire and the leftover crackle in a corner, the roar of police sirens getting louder. 

He can’t scream. He can’t move. 

Barry’s on him, he’s saying something again. Noise is a crescendo of static, but Hartley can read lips. Barely. He’s got spots in his eyes the size of diamonds. 

_Are you okay?_ Barry’s asking. 

Hartley shakes his head. Doesn’t start screaming, though he’s on the verge of a nervous breakdown on top of all this. 

_We need to go_ . Barry’s looking around him, hearing something that scares him more than a killer who’s bound to have seen the Flash’s signature streak racing out of Barry Allen’s apartment. _Where do we go?_

Hartley opens his mouth and lets out a pitiful groan of pain, twisting and writhing away from Barry. He just - has to move. Has to leave, has to keep going and fight out the pain. Find a pharmacy and drown Exalgo so he can think again. Recover. 

Barry pulls him back by the collar, framing his hands on Hartley’s face. _Where do we go?_ he shouts again, face marred by smoke and terror. 

Hartley breathes, screams again, and Barry feels the exposed wires of Hartley’s ears. Winces. 

“Orchestra hall,” Hartley whispers. “We have to go there.” 

_We need to go to a doctor,_ Barry says. 

“No!” Hartley fights to keep his eyes open. “Definitely _not_. Orchestra.” 

_You’re dying!_

“I’ll live - maybe. If I do, there will be no point to any of this because I’ll be in _jail_.” 

Barry nods. Nods again. _Okay_ , he says. _You’ll live. Trust me._

Hartley can’t read the rest of Barry’s bleeding lips, as his eyes have lost the will to work. 


	3. Chapter 3

viii. 

The blockade of police cars fences in the exhausted and terrified police officers who survey the crime scene of their own offices. Detective Joe West reviews with the crime scene cleaners and the CCTV that there was no one in the building at the time of explosion, and that there is no clue as to who planted the generic TNT bomb on the second floor, or how they smuggled it past the door. 

“Hey, Joe,” Singh says at once, reaching out with one hand to get his attention while still on the phone. “Another report just came in. There’s been a second explosion.” 

“What? Where else could they possibly want to target? City Hall? Iron Heights? How many dead?” 

“It’s an apartment building downtown, actually. Only one apartment exploded, and the explosion didn’t even crack a wall, apparently. Reports are sketchy on whether it was an explosion or an intense, sudden fire. All the other tenants are fine.” 

“Where is it?” Joe frowns. 

Singh rattles off the address as he hears it, and Joe drops his clipboard. 

“What is it?” Singh asks. He probably doesn’t want to know the answer. 

“That’s Barry’s apartment,” Joe says, and turns around to look for Eddie Thawne, clenching shaking hands. “What did the police trail we sent to protect him say?” He nods at the phone. 

“We don’t have any word on them, actually. Can only assume they’ve gone rogue. Fuck, it’s Allen they attacked?” He turns back to the phone, barking a question, and turned back to Joe. “No John Doe in the apartment.” 

Joe screamed for Eddie to get over, and he detaches himself from his conversation. “Barry’s apartment was also targeted,” he says in a rush, “but Barry himself is nowhere to be found.” 

Eddie pauses and looks at Singh. “It has to be Captain Cold,” he says. “We’ve all seen the video. Barry was on Rathaway’s side, for all intents and purposes. This -” he gestures to the rubble of the Precinct, “is the first shot of a war.” 

The other Detective and the Captain nod. Singh says, “We’re putting you in charge of finding Allen. Thawne - you can do this, right?” 

_Barry’s still alive and missing_ is on a loop in Eddie’s mind. He nods, the sense memory of his last meeting with Barry on the forefront of his consciousness. “I have to find him.” 

Singh taps Joe on the shoulder. “I need _you_ to be in charge of organizing a patrol for the streets now that it looks like we’ll have to prevent a gang war. Better marshall law than anarchy.” 

Eddie spins around and walks back to his car. He doesn’t stumble. He doesn’t do anything but run his hand through his hair and feels the coarse blond strands, feels the absence of Barry run through his body. 

_Why weren’t you in your apartment?_

_Were you warned?_

_Were you out unaware? Are you still out somewhere, completely clueless to the attempt on your life?_

_What would I do with myself if you had been caught in the fire?_

He leans against his car, and the metal is still scalding from the explosion. Eddie will visit Barry’s apartment and look around, just to see for himself. 

Just to make sure Barry’s alive. 

ix. 

Hartley comes to consciousness again, this time acutely aware of plastic bags wrapped over his ears, layers thick. He raises his head from where he lies - on the front-row seats facing an empty orchestral stage - and mutters, “Bar?” 

Barry Allen’s head snaps up from his resting place on the floor, and he gives Hartley a smile. _You okay?_ he mouths, pointing at Hartley’s ears. 

Hartley snaps his fingers and hears the intense echo of it. He shakes his head. 

Barry mouths, _What do we do now?_

“We wait,” Hartley hisses. “You didn’t happen to grab my glasses, did you?” 

Barry shakes his head. 

“Fuck,” Hartley sighs. “That’s _great_. Is the entire city looking for you yet?” 

Barry frowns. _What?_

“Your apartment _did_ blow up,” Hartley shrugs, wincing at the sound his thin undershirt makes against the cushioned pew. The soundproof walls of this hall mask most all other sounds outside of the building. “CCPD’s probably having a field day. First, lowly forensic analyst seen in public with the gay Rathaway? And _then_ presumed dead? How have they connected you to the sinister puzzle of Central City’s crime streak?” 

Barry flips him off, not even bothering to front a smile. 

“Hey.” Hartley scrambles to a sitting position and his forearms feel like brittle paper about to crack. He glances down to see peeling skin and blisters. “Are you okay?” 

“I - well, I keep thinking about what Eddie would do if I died, if he thought I was dead. You know he didn’t say sorry about propositioning me, not really.” Barry drops his forehead into his hands, and Hartley winces at the _smack_ of skin, reaching up to cover his ears. “What would Joe do if I died? Or Iris?” 

Hartley watches the way he wipes tears out of his eyes before they fully form, and how he sniffles like a hurricane before saying, “But it’s fine.” 

“Bullshit,” Hartley raises an eyebrow, and Barry notices his hands are still cupped over his ears. Hartley waves off his concern. “You’ve never been presumed dead before - Barry Allen hasn’t, at any rate. There are fucking consequences, but it’s not your fault.” 

“Whose fault is it, then? Why would anyone want to kill a forensic analyst?” 

“Who knows. A groupie, maybe, furious at you for fucking me.” 

Barry flips him off again. “Don’t say that.” 

“ _Or_ it was Leonard Snart, finally getting around to avenging me. I bet it would be this.” 

“I told him that you weren’t going to infringe on his reign, though. There’s _no reason_ why you two had to fight.” 

Hartley _was_ going to kill Snart eventually. After he had given Barry information on Stagg Industries anyone with a background in chemistry could gather (except that no one had thought to investigate the corporate capital of Central City, _that’s_ all credited to Snart), Hartley would make the death look accidental. Overload his cold gun, maybe. Run an eighteen wheeler into him. 

“Do you regret helping me?” Hartley asks. He has to ask. (If Barry regrets it, Hartley will leave him in this hall, regardless of what his gut feels for that perfect jawline. Hartley will replace his hearing aids and build an empire from the ground up by himself. He’s done it before.) 

“No,” Barry shakes his head. His shirt crinkles, only barely obnoxious. “You’re the only friend I have left. But I keep thinking - I did all this so that Snart would get me information. He’s not planning on fulfilling that if he wants me dead, right?” 

“Spot on,” Hartley breathes. 

“So what do we do about this?” An edge blossoms in Barry’s voice, sharp as a fishhook. “How do we kill him?” 

Hartley blinks. Barry Allen, kill count of zero, who uses super speed to avoid accidentally squashing flies, is shaking and staring at the ground in front of him. It’s not bloodlust that drives him (Hartley’s too familiar with fire coursing down his spine and can recognize it on the spot), but something deeper. 

Barry locks gazes with him, and he’s only just holding it together. “ _Fuck_ , Hartley, please. My family - they wouldn’t survive if I was truly dead.” 

_And what about me? What will I do if the Flash dies while breaking into the Rogue’s headquarters? How the fuck do you think_ I _will survive without you on the other end of my three a.m. texts?_

“We need to wait until Snart comes out into the open,” Hartley states the obvious. “That will take a week, at least, unless he has something else up his sleeve. For right _now_ , I get new hearing aids so your constipated breathing doesn’t rattle my skull. But first I need to catch up on my beauty sleep.” 

“Oh,” Barry blinks. “Hartley, I’m so _sorry_ , I didn’t mean -” 

“Please,” Hartley winces. “Stop talking.” He gestures to his plastic-wrapped ears and sees Allen wilt, the flight leaving him in a slump of posture. 

Barry waves off the guilt, mouthing _I’ll just be asleep if you need me._

Hartley manages to maintain his irritated smirk as Barry curls away from him, and then drops the facade, turning into the crook of his arm as he desperately tries not to hyperventilate. 

_But what will I do if you die?_ Hartley wants to scream. _How will I deal with myself if you kill yourself with your aspirations for peace?_

He knows the answer to this question. 

He can’t. 

x. 

Eddie sees Iris at the burnt out shell of Barry’s apartment as he exits his police car, lights still alternating. Reflector vest-donned officers tape up the entrance to the building in crime scene yellow, staving off the sizable crowd of the homeless and hookers around snapping pictures of the smoke. 

“Hey,” Iris greets. “It’s been a long day.” 

Eddie’s not sure if she wants to remember what happened earlier today, when she took a potshot at Barry Allen, his (probably _former_ ) boyfriend. “Sure,” he shrugs. 

“The photographers won’t let me into the building,” she continues. 

“Oh.” Of course that’s what this sudden friendship is for, the YouTube account with more subscribers than the Picture News. Her waning smile isn’t a sudden bond over a tragic accident. “Of course.” 

The officers let them up the lobby, and their dress shoes clack on tile stairs. Eddie’s throat burns with latent smoke inhalation - and he can _smell_ more smoke emanating from the floors above - and the ache in his chest. He wants to say _sorry_ at the walls that may hold Barry’s ghost, he wants to scream _please, we didn’t mean to hurt you,_ but it’s too late. If not here, Barry is probably a John Doe in an alley, gutted by people trying to make a point because of _Hartley Rathaway_. 

Officers greet Eddie at the door and don’t bother to address Iris. They inform him of the origin of the intense fire and tell him there’s barely any evidence left. 

A brunette walks over to him as he surveys the upturned sofa. “You’re the one leading the response team, right?” 

“Yep.” Eddie walks into another room, but she follows. 

“I hope you find him. You two were good together.” 

Eddie’s heart almost stops, and he turns to her, locking his jaw for a brawl. “You _knew_?” 

“I - you two weren’t very subtle,” she says. “You always did smile when he walked into the room.” 

“Thank you.” Eddie can’t bring a smile to his face now. 

Someone knows. Maybe _everyone_ knows. (Maybe Joe knows.) 

Eddie wanders to the windowsill, which was apparently open at the time of the explosion. No one can agree on whether it was a proper explosion that only tossed all the furniture to the walls or a highly contained fire. Barry really _was_ the best at documenting fire. 

Eddie takes a deep breath. When everyone at the CCPD had seen the face of their recently robbed top analyst on the front page of the Picture News, they had glanced at Joe constantly, not Eddie. No one had known _then_. 

Joe looked disturbed, but Eddie was almost sure it wasn’t the probably-hadn’t-come-out part. 

(All Eddie did after the news had dropped at their door was revisit his browsing history on asexuality and sexual repulsion and wonder where on the Kinsey scale did _this_ revelation come from. Or was it just _him_? Did Barry think he was too boring, too unattractive? Didn’t want to stoop to a low enough level to sleep with the Detective? Did all of Barry’s overwhelming adrenaline from almost dying transfer into calling Hartley Rathaway, the _criminal_ , for a wild night?) 

(And then the video circled of Hartley Rathaway in a piss-poor disguise battling other criminals in the mob headquarters, and what he did the night before didn’t matter, except it _did_ , so much.) 

Eddie opens his eyes and he’s on the floor, clutching a pair of glasses he grabbed in his panic, heartbeat rapping a terrible melody in his chest. 

Glasses. 

“Hey, have these been documented?” Eddie says to no one, and someone shakes their head. Eddie doesn’t hand them the glasses, though. He stares at the brown frame and the blockish consistency. “Holy shit,” he says. A few eyes turn. “These belong to Rathaway.” 

Iris notices at this, and turns from where she managed to get good lighting for her camera. “No shit,” she says, curling a lip at the glasses. “Well, _that’s_ a new theory. That bastard.” 

“What?” the crime scene photographer asks, confused. 

Eddie just locks gazes with Iris. He hadn’t felt so connected to her since before everything. “You think this is a good indication?” he asks rhetorically, passing off the glasses so he doesn’t shatter them in rage. 

“Undoubtedly,” Iris says, and she’s still filming on her phone’s camera. “You know what this means? Rathaway did sleep with Bar - _Allen_ , to get a layout of his apartment, and then set it on fire and kidnapped him to declare is mob lord status.” 

“It’s a ‘fuck you’ to the police,” Eddie sighs. _This kind of thing doesn’t happen without prior warning_. “So he’s still alive, but not for long.” 

“Rathaway will kill him, filmed live, of course.” They build off of each other, a mix of past cases and terror merging into a story to feed an audience of millions. 

“We don’t have long,” Eddie whispers, in a full blown panic. “He’s just a lab technician, and Rathaway has unknown sonic technology. He can’t - oh, god, I bet he’s so terrified.” 

Iris is there, then, hugging him, enveloping Eddie in comfort he barely remembers. “Joe shouldn’t have put you on this case; it’s too personal.” 

“ _You’re_ here, and you grew up with him,” Eddie reminds her. “There’s no way in hell I’m backing down now. It’s my responsibility to bring him back safely, just like it was my responsibility not to ask him back to my place. I should have known - _Iris, I should have known_.” 

“How would you have known?” she says into his shoulder. 

“He would have never run to the one person that will _kill_ him if it wasn’t for me.” Eddie’s sobbing now. Iris is around him and completely silent. Fuck, she probably agrees with the statement. 

“Hartley’s the enemy,” she reminds him. “Remember that. The man you need to go after took your boyfriend and you need to find him. _Remember_ that.” 

Eddie lets go of her. “I will,” he promises. 

“I want to come with you,” Iris says. 

Eddie watches her steely, reporter-esque appearance, her posture rigid despite the fact that it’s the early hours of the morning. “Okay,” he says. There’s no way he could turn her down. 

“Great,” Iris smiles professionally. “Now, who do we know that can track Rathaway?” 

Eddie blinks. “Harrison Wells, probably.” 

xi. 

“I need to rebuild my hearing aids,” Hartley says as soon as he wakes again, accompanied by a cramping stomach and swelling on his arms. 

“You need to continue resting,” Barry says, noticing the way Hartley winces as he moves to stand. Hartley nods an affirmative and lies back down on the seat. 

Barry’s dressed in clothes fresh from the mall, and hands Hartley a bottle of water. “Drink first.” 

Hartley downs the water and coughs weakly. “You need to steal me the supplies for it - but don’t worry, you just have to break into warehouses for them. No cameras there.” 

“Don’t you have extras?” 

“Sure. In my _apartments_ , which are currently bugged by the CCPD. I’m _not_ letting you risk yourself as _Barry Allen_ to break in there.” 

“You can’t _build_ anything in your current state! Look at you, you wince at the sound of my _voice_. What will happen when the orchestra crew come in and notice a wanted fugitive on their floor, tinkering with metal? _What happens then_?” 

“No one comes in here until mid afternoon,” Hartley waves his hand. “I’ve done shit like this before; I can finish it before lunch.” 

“I won’t let you be caught, Hartley,” Barry says. 

“Then you can help and get me the components as soon as possible.” Hartley offers a shit-eating grin that defies the pain he feels on his head. 

“I started this, Rathaway! I was at the casino too! I will _not_ let the CCPD take you to Iron Heights for trespassing on fucking orchestra property!” 

“And _I_ won’t let the CCPD catch you as the Flash being connected to any more crimes because of the casino!” Hartley yells back. “As of right now, the Flash is pardoned, but if they see a streak of red on the cameras you will be hunted. That is _not a strategy we can reveal_. I can’t lose my queen while recovering my _hearing aids_.” 

“But you want your ‘queen’ to break into warehouses? How is that any better?” Barry spits, and he is _pissed_. 

Why is he pissed off at Hartley? He’s only trying to keep Barry out of trouble, especially after dragging him into this mob mess. 

“I can’t risk losing you,” Hartley snaps, and his facade crashes. “I can’t leave this building until the constant noise stops. All my apartments have been confiscated by now - well, there’s the one, but it was stripped months ago. You have to help me fix this, Barry, but I’m trying to keep you out of any real danger. Please, Bar.” 

Barry pulls up his hood and turns away. His hands are jittering like a low drum roll in Hartley’s ears. “Am I the only henchman you have left?” Barry asks measuredly. 

“ _What_?” 

“Am I the only person you can use who’s stuck with you until now, dammit! Answer the question!” Barry’s still locked in place away from Hartley. 

“No, of course not,” Hartley spits. “We’re partners, right? We have an agreement of friendship.” 

“You driving me home after a breakdown does _not equal_ me getting blown up by someone who I thought was an ally,” Barry yells, finally turning around. His eyes are drawn into a line, and his jaw is shaking. “All I’m doing is cleaning up your gigantic mess you shit on Central City, and I’m fucking done with it! There’s no obligation for me to stay, Rathaway, and you better remember that. So when I say I want to do something, it means I _will_ do something and you have no right to stop me.” 

“Exactly!” Hartley screams back at him. “You don’t have to stay, but you’re still here, and this is a way that will put you in _so much less danger_ , because I’ve thought this out! You _offered_ your help, Allen, remember?” 

“I don’t want to help anymore,” Barry cuts back, and it’s the final straw. “But I have something called _honor_ , so I will get the components of the aids, _your way_. And them I’m out of here. I will turn myself into the police and tell them whatever damn story I feel like, and this is _over_. I cannot live this fugitive life, and you will never stop running.” 

Hartley just stares, watching the younger man break down into a shell that’s standing so tall and so brittle. He watches Barry fold his arms and stare off into the corner to gather the little strength he had left. 

Hartley hears every sniffle Barry makes as he keeps the tears inside, and every jitter of his neck muscles in keeping his head held high. 

Barry clears his throat. “So tell me then, what do you need?” 

Hartley closes his mouth. His mind cannot fathom that _this is the end_. Barry cannot be seriously about to leave this soundproof safe haven to go where cameras and spies will catch him, or (depending on whose side the spies are on) leave his body, diaphragm split in half, in a ditch. 

“If you’re thinking up a way to convince me to stay, I will leave _now_ ,” Barry warns at the silence. 

So Hartley lists of the components, warehouse addresses, and descriptions of the packages by memory, without inflection. He can’t _dare_ to think about the words, lest he beg Barry Allen to please give him another chance, even though it’s completely within his right to leave the crippled Rathaway far behind in the dust and journey onto to better and brighter things. 

But fuck, Hartley _needs_ a friend. 

(On the other hand, fuck it, Hartley Rathaway can _deal_ without friends. He’s dealt without friends most of his life.) 

Barry smiles without affection at him. “I’ll be back in a second,” he says, “and then hopefully you’ll never see me again.” 

“You can’t fucking mean that, Bar. I’ve always been there for you.” Hartley tries to scramble for something, but he can’t _fucking think_ with the noise in his ears and the drain in his head. “Please. I have no one left.” _I love you._

In response, Barry freezes, face growing pale, and just says, “Fuck _you_ ,” and disappears in a red flash of lighting. Because his mind hadn’t hot-wired to the situation yet, it still gives Hartley a faint sense of contentment to notice the lightning out the orchestra hall doors. 

Fuck, Barry had been so angry at Hartley, so vengeful and yearning for something better than the dump Hartley had been reduced to. Rightly so - everything Barry did was for a reason, and it was always for the right reason. (Hartley stole money from Rathaway Inc. to give away to charities because he had no planS for it, and Barry Allen stole money to pay investigators of the metahuman kind.) 

Hartley takes a deep breath, running through the list of instructions to create the suppressors, focusing on nothing but the phantom creation and the knowledge of how to function like a normal human. 

It takes him five minutes to realize that Barry’s not returning with the items. It takes him another few minutes, in which Hartley staves off a panic attack with every focused nerve in his body, for him to react to it. 

Hartley’s never going to hear without pain again. After the explosion, Hartley had created temporary dampeners from the parts of an overturned bus after two uninterrupted days and several torn fingernails. Now he’s not going to live long enough to find another bank of spare parts. 

Barry did truly leave him for dead. 

Hartley’s ears lock onto a sound that’s all too familiar to him - the sound of the absolute zero gun being fired. He flattens himself on the floor underneath the seats, curling up into a ball of sweat and haywire nerves until he realizes the sound is miles away. 

But still. Hartley closes his eyes and focuses on the sound of Snart’s gun, and Snart’s remark that comes with it. 

_“Not too bad of a remake.”_

_“Fucking thanks. Let us go now, maybe? We did everything you asked.”_

Hartley would always remember that voice, filled with enough snark to be Hartley’s match and anger unmatched by any other of Hartley’s former _friends_. It belongs to Cisco Ramon. 

Which, holy fuck, meant that Snart was in STAR Labs. In _control_ of STAR Labs. 

_“What’s that?”_ Snart asks. 

_“That is a knock on our front door, so to speak,”_ the ever-calm voice of Harrison Wells replies. 

_“And who is it?”_

_“Looks like a member of the CCPD,”_ Cisco snarls. _“Looks like your gig is about at the end.”_

Lisa Snart comments, _“They had no time to alert the police about our break-in, so what is he here for?”_

_“Let’s find out,”_ Snart growls. _“Open the front doors.”_

Hartley blinks back to reality as blood clogs his ears. If Snart and crew had occupied STAR Labs and took control of the scientists there, he could potentially do _anything_. 

Hartley feels his life seep out of his ears with his lifeblood. Barry would do something about this, but he’s not here, will never be here again. There’s nothing he can do if he doesn’t know. 

He gets to his feet with a constant stream of _fuck it, I can do this even without the hearing aids. I’m Hartley Rathaway. Of course I can do this without the aids._

Hartley wraps his arms around himself and his thin undershirt, covered in blood. STAR Labs is three miles away with midnight traffic and CCTV everywhere, but _fuck it_. Someone has to stop Snart before he detonates the city. 

xii. 

Iris taps on the key code of the STAR Labs front door, eyeing the warehouse-esque metal covering pulled down over the revolving entrance. “You sure Harrison Wells has the connections to find Barry?” she asks, her handheld camera at the ready. 

Eddie lets out a sigh. “I don’t know,” he says, “but his former employer would be the place to start.” 

Iris taps the keypad again, pressing the call button. She cranes her neck to stare at the lights blaring from the penthouse. “Well, _someone’s_ home, and not doing anything. Maybe we’re interrupting a midnight work something.” 

“Well, we’re on _official_ police business,” Eddie growls as he jams the button again. “If no one answers, I swear I will fall asleep on the spot.” 

“Need more coffee?” Iris asks sympathetically. 

“Always.” 

The keypad buzzes from the mic and Caitlin Snow answers in a shaky voice. “Who is this?” 

“Doctor Snow,” Eddie jumps to the opportunity, “I’m sorry for interrupting, but I am Detective Thawne from the CCPD. I was wondering if I could speak to Harrison Wells about a case.” 

“I’m afraid Harrison Wells isn’t here at the moment.” A noticeable quiver split the sentence, and Caitlin laughed to cover it up. “I’m sorry, it’s just been a long day. If you could come back tomorrow -” 

“Well, it would still be of some use to ask you questions pertaining to the case, as soon as possible,” Eddie presses. “I’m sorry if it inconveniences you, but this is a time-sensitive job.” 

“Oh. Well, in that case, come on up. I’ll send down someone to unlock the door.” Caitlin laughs again and hangs up. 

Iris shrugs at Eddie. “Are the sciency types always this strung out?” she wonders. 

“Probably nerves from thesis deadlines or something,” he says. 

They wait in silence and then the side door opens, keys jingling and dropping to the floor behind the metal grid. 

“Sorry,” comes the shaky reply of Cisco Ramon to a silent partner, and the metal covering opens. “Hey,” he grins, and he’s as pale as concrete. 

“Who were you talking to?” Eddie nods to the dimly lit entrance behind him. 

Cisco wavers, blinks hugely, and offers another, larger, smile. “No one. I talk to myself sometimes. You know, it might be a bad time to come by, it _is_ the middle of the night, and I’m sure you have so much to do, with the explosion. Do you smell the smoke in the air? Because I’m sure the wind blew this way.” 

He winces visibly and Eddie steps in the doorway. “Are you okay?” Eddie asks, searching Cisco’s eyes. 

“Peachy,” Cisco hisses. 

“Well then.” Eddie puts a hand on the gun in his waistband. His Adam’s apple jams uncomfortably at the scene before him. “Lead the way up.” He turns. “Iris, you may want to go back to the Precinct and tell them what’s happened, and where I’m at.” He tries to convey all the panic possible. 

Iris frowns. “I’m coming with you, of course,” she says, and barges in after Eddie. They enter a darkened hallway, and the door shuts behind them even though Cisco is still in front of them. 

Eddie whirls around, gun extended, and a burst of absolute zero catches the weapon and freezes it completely. Eddie drops it, regret pooling in his gut. “Show yourself,” he growls. 

Captain Cold emerges from the shadows, wearing a smirk. “Well, it certainly does work fine in the field, Ramon. This was, by far, the _easiest_ trap I’ve ever set for a member of the law before. So eager for information about your missing boy toy, Thawne? Aren’t we all.” 

“ _You_ have Barry?” Iris interrupts, and Cold points the absolute zero gun at her. 

“ _Wouldn’t you like to know_ ,” Cold sneers. “Don’t make any sudden movements and head to the elevators.” 

“Why would you hold him captive in STAR Labs?” Eddie asks as the three of them are pushed to the elevators. 

“He doesn’t have Barry,” Cisco says. “He just has all the STAR tech.” 

“Well, he’s on the ground floor, and I was under the impression all the tech was in the labs on the upper floors?” Iris whispers. 

“His crew is here,” Cisco says. “Lisa, Rory.” 

“Into the elevator,” barks Cold, waving the gun like an amateur bank robber, but Eddie had seen the blueprints for the weapon on Barry’s bulletin board, and it isn’t something he could fight Cold for. He would just have to wait his time. 

On the way to the top floor, Iris asks, “Why are you taking us hostage instead of just turning us away? Do you _want_ the full force of Central City against you?” 

“Oh please,” Cold snorts. “As if you can do anything against us. You couldn’t even do anything about the Flash problem of yours.” 

Eddie notices Cisco flicking his gaze down at his nails at that mention. “What is it?” 

“What’s what?” Cisco presses his mouth into a firm and unyielding line. 

“Do you know something that could help us about the Flash?” 

Cold rolls his eyes. “You know I can hear everything you say, right?” 

“Of course,” Iris interrupts primly. “Just planting seeds of misinformation into your head.” 

“If it’s about the Flash,” Cold winks at Cisco, “then don’t you worry. I blew up that problem roughly three hours ago.” 

Iris puts the math together before Eddie. “You blew up Barry’s apartment three hours ago. What else did you blow up?” 

Cold looks at Cisco and laughs as the elevator doors swing open and he ushers them all out. “I was surprised you never told them, Ramon, but I can see why. It’s kind of cute watching them flail around.” 

Lisa Snart greets them, a golden gun in her hands. “Thanks for repairing this,” she smiles at Ramon sweetly. “Roughly half your belongings are gold now.” 

Cisco sees the entire wall of dripping, coagulating gold consuming hanging projects and blueprints and computer monitors, and takes an aborted step. “You _couldn’t have_.” 

“Lisa,” Cold reprimands, “we may have had to use some of those.” 

“Nah,” she grins. “I took all the weapons out before target practice.” 

The voice of Mick Rory calls out, “You need to get the prisoners in one place so we can guard them easier.” 

The prisoners are pushed to the corner of the control room, and Rory sits on a chair, his absolute hot gun pointed at a calm Harrison Wells almost lounging in his wheelchair and Caitlin Snow. 

Once they are all pushed in the huddle of the employees of STAR Industries and Rory is paying more visible attention to the Rogues planning, Eddie turns to Cisco. “What was that about? Do you know what happened to Barry after the explosion?” 

Cisco frowns. “Isn’t he dead?” 

“No one was in the apartment when it blew, but there were traces of Hartley Rathaway there.” 

“Well, I haven’t seen Barry in almost a year, since he quit volunteering,” Cisco shrugs, and he looks visibly relieved as he says it. He and Caitlin share a look. “I’m glad he wasn’t there.” 

Rory hisses at them, “Quiet!” 

Len and Lisa are discussing their plans while flicking through security tapes of the area around the building. 

“So we _film_ their deaths?” Lisa wrinkles her nose. “That sounds a bit unlike us.” 

“We need the publicity. We need all the police officers we can to be within the target range before we light the skyline up with bits and pieces of this tower,” Rory reminds her from his seat. 

“I still don’t like it,” Lisa crosses her arms. 

“Well, deal with it,” Len snaps. “Soon we’ll rule Central and we won’t have to plan our survival any longer. We’ll be _free_.” 

“You’ve said soon for years,” Lisa says. “I hope this is the last.” 

Eddie turns to Wells, unnoticed. “Any way we can get free?” 

“I have a hidden room if we can get to the hallway,” Wells murmurs back. “But the Rogues currently have all our weapons in a pile they are guarding, so you’re in charge of the break out.” 

Eddie nods and starts looking around the room for something he can grab onto. 

“Fire hydrant,” Iris points out. 

“Too far away,” Doctor Snow whispers. “They’ll freeze us long before we reach it.” 

“There has to be a distraction,” Cisco says from his position crouched on the floor. “Someone has to attract their attention and the others have to split up for different weapons so at _least_ one of us makes it and can warn the world that they’re planning to blow this place up, too.” 

“I’ll be the distraction,” Iris says. “I’m a journalist. As long as I keep my camera on, I will technically be documenting everything that’s happening to us. They’ll believe me, won’t they?” 

“It’s our best plan,” Eddie nods. “So, who’s going to the fire hydrant?” 

“You do it,” Cisco nudges. “You’ve got the best chance of making it out of here alive. I’ll go for the medical room, see if I can barricade myself and find _something_ connected to WiFi.” 

“Caitlin?” 

“Weapons pile.” She glares at it with a conviction Eddie has only seen from determined officers. She would need it, too. 

“Doctor Wells?” 

Wells shakes his head. “I’ll be of no use,” he says. “I’ll lead the way to the room.” 

Iris fumbles with the camera and turns it on, a brave smile on her face. 

“What’s the go signal?” Cisco asks. 

“I don’t know. I’ll make something up.” Iris steps out of the confined circle. 

Rory notices and motions at the camera with his gun. “What’s that for?” 

“This is for journalism, Mr. Rory. Now, if you wouldn’t mind answering a few questions for the press?” 

“Fuck. Hey, Len,” Rory cranes his neck around, “want even more publicity?” 

Len stows his absolute zero gun and walks to the prisoners. “You know I do. Ms. West, I presume. I’ve heard quite a lot about you. With such a prestigious position online, I’m sure this tape will end up on the front cover of every newspaper. _Freelance Journalist Documents Her Own Death_. Classic.” 

“I have one question in particular regarding your plans for the city,” Iris says. “Why did you target Barry Allen?” 

Snart laughs. “That’s it, West? Worried about your brother? Out of everything you could ask - why I came here, what I did at the casino, why I’m currently holding you all hostage - you ask about Barry fucking Allen. Cute.” 

“Are you going to answer it or am I going to ask again?” Iris takes another step to him, glaring up into his blank eyes. “Because trust me, you won’t enjoy it if I have to ask again.” 

Snart laughs again, and looks over his shoulder at Rory, who is grinning at the question. “Tell them,” Rory says. “Tell the _entire world_.” 

“Sure,” Snart says. “Just get the live feed online.” 

Iris takes another step closer to him. “Why Barry Allen, Snart? He wasn’t even that in-the-know in the police force. He didn’t even work at the crime scene of the casino! There was no reason for you to take him down, unless you were just trying to get Rathaway. I don’t see why you had to almost take down an entire apartment complex to get to him. A bullet in the head would have done it.” 

“True, but that’s too subtle. Too mysterious. Who could it _possibly_ be that shot Rathaway? The blame would probably be targeted at me, but there would be no way to be sure. And with all the other villains and vigilantes the Piper had pissed off, it would be anyone’s guess. But fire is Rory’s touch - even though, of course, we were nowhere near the scene of the crime at the time.” 

“So it _was_ just for Rathaway?” Iris steps closer, again, only an inch from his face. “You risked the particular wrath of the police almost killing _one of their own_ for an internal feud? You fucking bastard.” 

Snart leers at her momentarily. “Wait. Almost killed?” 

“That’s right,” Iris grins. “They weren’t there when the bomb detonated. Maybe neither of them were there in the first place. We really can’t be sure. However, you _did_ buy yourself a shitload of enemies, and we’re always happy to oblige.” 

At once, she drops her camera, still filming, and catches Snart’s jaw in an upper hook. The other prisoners run for their respective destinations, and Snart keels over, reaching for the gun in his waistband. Iris kicks on his ribs, screaming. 

Lisa Snart targets the fire hydrant, covering it in golden goop. Eddie just lifts it and throws it at her head. She ducks, and it punches through a window, falling to the ground stories below. 

Caitlin reaches the weapon pile, and squeezes the trigger of a machine gun. The bullets tear through the monitors, obliterating any CCTV the Rogues were observing. Rory’s weapon envelops the gun in ash and she drops it, reaching for another. 

“Touch another gun and you will die,” Rory says. “Of course, you’re going to die anyway, but this will be painful, I assure you.” 

Caitlin doesn’t reach for a gun. 

Cisco is dragged out of the medical examination room by Lisa, the golden gun pressed to his spine. “One move out of _any of you_ and you will be a statue forever, or until I throw you out the window,” she screams. 

No one moves. 

“You bitch,” Len stands up, spitting blood out of his mouth and pressing the barrel of his gun against Iris’ head, who glares back into his eyes. “I may not even save you for the live show. I may kill you now. You never know. Well? Pick up the goddamn camera and hope to fuck it’s still recording. That’s the only thing your life is hinging on.” 

Iris picks the camera up, and it is still recording. “It’s fine,” she says. 

“Good.” Len grins. “We have the stream set up. Drag them over here.” 

Rory and Lisa crowd the five prisoners to in front of the cameras, and with the three guns between the Rogues no one moves another muscle. 

“Central City,” Captain Cold addresses the camera, “if you’re wondering why this is broadcasted on all major systems, it’s because I have a very important message to tell everyone - especially you, CCPD. I know you’re watching. Do you recognize this man?” He tugs on Eddie and pulls him closer to the camera. “This is your oh-so-brave detective. I think I’ll kill him first, just to make an impression.” 

Lisa forces Eddie onto his knees, her golden gun pressed against the prominent vein in Eddie’s neck. 

Len presses his absolute zero gun at Eddie’s forehead, jamming it so it makes a circular impression in the sweating flesh. “You don’t fucking like that, Detective? This is for every time you’ve tried to take the Rogues out, for every bullet you’ve put in our backs. This is fucking payment, while the world stands trial.” 

He turns to the camera. “Doesn’t he _fucking_ deserve this? Because all of us are in agreement that he must die.” 

Eddie closes his eyes. “Fuck, I’m so sorry, Barry,” he blurts out, and then clenches his jaw. 

“Nothing aside from that to say, Detective?” Lisa jeers. “Not your ex-girlfriend, who’s _in the room_? Nothing to say to her?” 

Eddie keeps his eyes closed. 

“Well,” she sighs, “better get this over with. We have four left to go.” 


	4. Chapter 4

xiii. 

The barred door to the labs blast open, and smoke rolls into the room, fogging the cameras. 

Cold aims his gun on the waves of disorientation. “Who’s there?” he demands. “ _Allen_?” 

Eddie takes the moment to tackle Snart, kneeing him in the face and grappling with the absolute zero gun. Shots fire in different directions, freezing panes of glass on the wall. Gold cracks and shatters, littering the floor. 

Another blast of invisible force powers through the damage and dust, and Rory collapses, coughing. The employees of STAR Industries and the guests dart to see who the interruption is, and Caitlin Snow picks up the dropped absolute hot gun. 

“Who is it?” Eddie asks, pointing the absolute zero gun at the unknown. 

“Fucking _chill_ , Detective, it’s just me.” Hartley Rathaway walks out of the smoke, waving it off and coughing. He is covered in dried blood. 

“Hartley,” Cisco says, eyeing him warily. “I hear you and Barry were shacking it up.” 

“Cisquito,” Hartley leers at him, a prelude to a monologue. However, he coughs again, blood running from his lips onto the tile, and he doubles over, catching himself on the counter. A simple metal contraption runs across his fingers, held together with duct tape and sheer force of will. A similar contraption encircles his ears, on the verge of breaking apart. “Ow, _fuck_.” 

Eddie is at his side in a second. “What happened?” he demands. 

“You know how much of a pain it is to break into a lab and find a secret stash of sonic weapons after being blown up twice? In the _dark_? I just saved your life. Anyone seen Barry Allen?” 

“Yeah, he’s not here,” Cisco says, approaching Hartley slowly and pulling out a rolling chair from under the desk. “Sit down, you’re about to _die_ .” 

Hartley does sit, curling in on himself to check his shuddering legs. 

“Why would you think Barry would be here?” Iris wonders aloud. “Everyone’s been mentioning him recently - oh, don’t you _fucking dare_ stand up.” She grabs a discarded shotgun and pistol whips Rory in the forehead. He collapses again. 

“Holy fuck,” Cisco says. “That was badass.” 

“And what about me?” Hartley coughs. “I literally just saved your lives.” 

“And before that, you were involved in _two explosions_ ,” Eddie says, pulling up another chair across from him. “Talk.” 

Hartley waves a hand. “I don’t feel like it, Thawne. I’ve cleaned up your messes _two times_ now, so I think we’re even.” 

“Two times? Was there another time you saved my life and I didn’t know it?” Eddie asks. 

Hartley rolls his eyes, undermined by the reopened and bleeding cut on his forehead. “Remember Saturday night? When you majorly fucked up and I had to network with Allen to save your entire relationship?” 

“Well, what the fuck was on the front of the Monday tabloids? You fucking him in a store? Did _that_ ‘saved my relationship’?” 

“Hey, that didn’t happen,” Hartley said. “The press got out of hand, as usual. But I believe he already told you that, and you didn’t listen to him.” 

“And another thing,” Eddie snarls, “ _you being in his apartment when it fucking blew up_.” 

“I didn’t do that either!” Hartley says. “I was completely unaware of that.” 

“How did you both escape?” Iris asks. “I mean, you’re the one that just confirmed that you were both in your apartment at the time of the explosion.” 

Hartley glares at Cisco, who adopts a posture as eager to blame him as Iris. “Yeah,” he mimics, “how did you get the fuck out of dodge, _Piper_?” 

Iris brings her camera up to record the confession. 

Harrison Wells is fiddling with the live video, still streaming. 

“If you must know, it was the Flash. _But_ he’s innocent of both explosions as well, and actively tried to stop both. Don’t go after him.” 

“The numerous robberies are still being investigated,” Eddie says. “We’ll hunt him down, even if he wasn’t an active part of the current gang war.” 

Hartley laughs, rubbing his eyes not covered by glasses. “It’s not a gang war yet,” he promises. “But _fuck_ , if you don’t call off the police squads surrounding the labs, it will be.” 

Caitlin looks out a busted-through window. “There are at least twenty cop cars around the building,” she reports. 

“Great,” Eddie smiles. “You, Rathaway, will never escape now. Neither will the Rogues, but they’re all unconscious, right?” 

“You’re so unobservant,” Hartley spits. “I can hear the ticking of explosives somewhere I can’t pinpoint. The Rogues aren’t slow villains who would _publicly execute_ all of you and then rig this place to blow. It’s already primed and set. We need to evacuate the area.” He promptly bends over and vomits on the ground. 

Eddie turns to the STAR Labs employees. “Check for explosives,” he orders, and turns back to Hartley, shaking the limp man. “Fuck, Rathaway, you still have to answer my questions if we’re not all going to be dead by morning. If the Flash isn’t involved in both explosions, why was he at both? Was it because of _you_?” 

“Fuck me if I know,” Hartley scowls, mouth still stained red and teeth filled in with dripping slime. His eyes blink wildly, and the scar on his forehead is not his only injury. “He wouldn’t _stay when I needed him most,_ the fucking bastard.” 

“So you’re enemies?” Eddie grabs Hartley’s wrists and secures them at his sides to prevent any sudden movements. Hartley doesn’t fight him on this. He doesn’t do anything but _sag_ , his moment of glory over. 

“No,” Hartley looks out the window, to where he can hear the revolving drum of police sirens and the mill of officers readying a megaphone so they can deliver a message. “I don’t even know. Acquaintances, maybe. Partners in crime, but not really. He just needed information, and I needed the money. I guess that’s all - _oh, shit_.” 

He can hear the crinkle of familiar shoes on the pavement fifty floors below, the nervous hand running through the noticeable hair, the way his voice sounds distorted but so nervous, so fucking _raw_ , talking to Captain Singh. 

“What?” Eddie’s saying and tapping Hartley on the shoulder. 

“Has he zoned out?” Iris asks, leaning in with the camera. 

“Oh shit _what_?” Caitlin Snow is in his face. “Hartley, _fuck_ , we found TNT. What is the ticking, then - is it a spark they were planning on using to blow up all the _dynamite_ around the lab? How are we supposed to tell everyone to leave? We need your sound.” 

“Oh shit,” Hartley says again, standing up suddenly and almost falling on the contingent of people. “He’s here. You’re -” He trips over himself to the window, leaning out and trying to discern which one broke his soul, handicapped without glasses. All police sirens look the same, plumes of death circling their prey. “You’re fucking late as usual with my shit! And I _needed_ that shit, Allen! I fucking -” 

Hartley presses a button on his sonic finger glove, and presses it to his lips. A small light blinks red, _activated_. He clears his throat of life blood and mucus, dripping it back down into his stomach lining and lungs, and begins to speak. As he does, Cisco and Caitlin scour the control rooms for more wrapped sticks of dynamite. 

“Attention, CCPD. Please, stop what you’re doing.” 

His voice travels to the ground, like an angel on the brink of passing out on the windowsill and falling to his death. 

“I just want to alert all of you to the presence of _so many explosives_ placed in strategic locations in this building by various members of the Rogues. Have you been watching the live stream of all this - how very 2010 of them, I must admit - and you all have, then you will know that everything is fine and I have saved everything. So like. Maybe let me go just this once? The point is, please evacuate the fucking block.” Hartley coughs again, waving off Caitlin’s attempt to help him to a seat. 

“Fucking look for more dynamite,” he hisses at her, and tightens his grip on the windowsill. “Anyway, listeners, please clear the area in a few mile radius. That would be great of you. Oh, and Flash, I can hear you, I know you can hear me. Getting your ass up here and helping with the search would be nice, even though don’t you _dare_ use your super speed in case you set off the fuses. Oh, but don’t do it for _me,_ ” Hartley drags out, rolling his eyes, “because we all know how little of a fuck you give about me. Do it for your precious police force. Just come on, right now, no one will notice you. They’re all too busy looking at me to pay attention to you.” 

Hartley waves at the crowd for effect. “So, the side door’s key code is WELLS666, which I overrode it to, because I am a genius. And also a few minutes away from death, if the ticking of the timer which _no one’s found yet_ isn’t deceiving me. Which it isn’t, because no one prepared for the Pied Piper to crash their party. 

“You see, Flash,” he continues as he hears the side door clicking open on the ground. “I’m not leaving this lab until I get rid of the TNT, which you can’t really help with super speed. So I’m going to finally be a fucking superhero for once and stay behind. Don’t you dare try and save me.” 

“You can’t tell me what to do,” comes Barry Allen’s voice behind him, and Hartley laughs, turning around. 

“Fuck you, Allen,” he says, voice shot the hell and no longer amplified. “You used your super speed to _run up the stairs_ , and you could have blown everything to hell. Remember, you trail _lightning_. I’ve had too long a day for you to ruin it again.” 

Barry reaches for him, red leather suit portraying a very different man than the scared, angry scientist in over his head in his pursuit of information, how _very fucking noble of him_. 

Hartley takes a step away, and winces as his leg fails him. 

“You’re hurt,” Barry notes. “What did you _do_?” 

“What you fucking _left me to do_ ,” Hartley hisses, throwing his hand back up as he rolls into a sitting position. “I fucking saved Central City, or I will as soon as you get everyone else out before everything blows so I can get rid of as many sticks as possible, because no one found the _timer_ , and it’s still counting down.” He grits his teeth. “I’m going to assume it’s got a back up sparker, just in case, and I have to get rid of as much TNT as possible before the entirety of STAR Labs lights up in flames and then _fucking explodes_.” 

“Are you sure?” Barry asks, standing stock still. 

Hartley sneers at him. “As if you _care_ , Allen. As if you’ve ever cared, as if you didn’t dump me when I needed you the most. I don’t need you to save the day any more, I just need you to save everyone else. I will go out in the blaze of glory you never deserved.” 

“You deserve so much more,” Barry hisses. “You - fuck, _Hartley_ , why are you doing this? You’ve got so much self preservation in you, why would you sacrifice yourself? There’s a chance I could carry all the dynamite and throw them in the river so that they don’t blow. There’s a _chance_ I could do it.” 

“But why would you? You travelled up the stairs _once_ in super speed, but doing it again might trigger hidden explosives, and then we all die. You have everything, and I’m giving you the out you need to keep it. Keep your police boyfriend and your good fucking day job. Be _happy_ , Barry, because I haven’t been happy in five years and I can’t do this anymore. I’m a walking corpse by now anyway.” 

Barry turns to Caitlin, who touches his shoulder. “Just let him,” she says softly. “He’s right, you know. If anyone deserves to pay for what they’ve done by saving the world, it’s him. Not you.” 

He nods, and turns back to Hartley, who’s struggling to his feet. “Just go, _please_ ,” he says. “Evacuate everyone in a five mile radius, in case I fail.” 

“Okay.” Barry takes a deep breath, shaking his mask-covered head. “ _Okay_.” 

Hartley is left alone with the TNT sticks, and sets to work unwinding the dynamite from their fuses and rolling them to the window. Throwing them out onto the street would be the best way of ensuring that when STAR Labs went up in flames, nothing else did. 

His hands shake, almost uncontrollably, as he unwraps the zip ties around the striped orange and black. Something wet drips down his face as he comes to terms with the decision his adrenaline and moral convictions prompted him to say - that he isn’t coming out of this one alive. 

The ticking at the back of his hearing dampeners aren’t lying, and they’ve laid out a measure to the tone of his death, one hundred and forty-four beats to the quarter note. 

It’s the worst kind of music, when Hartley can never do anything to influence it, to change the nuances in the tone and to stop it completely when it becomes too much and overwhelms his ears. 

He gulps in a breath and feels his insides waver at the sound blasts he subjected himself to and his unending itchiness from the fire stretching over his skin. 

This is the last heist he would ever commit, fucking debugging TNT from their fuses to toss over the side of a building he swore he would never step foot in. 

Len had broken that particular conviction when he decided to rule the world. 

This would be Hartley’s legacy, wouldn’t it? This week of hectic plans for success and pitfalls of death would be the only thing people remembered of Hartley Rathaway. His mother would listen to his voicemail at least twice, maybe, before giving a cold eulogy at his unattended funeral. Maybe Barry would show up in a black suit, and maybe he would show some emotion, because he deserves that much, at least. 

Maybe. 

(But he won’t deserve even that, really. This is to make up for the past years of helping actively build an exploding particle accelerator and then causing mayhem because he couldn’t fucking deal with the outcome. This is only payment, not absolution.) 

And there’s a flash of lightning again, red against the backdrop of the settling control room, and Barry’s standing in front of him. 

“I _know_ I could have triggered the explosion, but I didn’t,” Barry says in a rush, “and I can’t take these and dump them in the nearest body of water, but I can help you defuse them and maybe you won’t have to give up the fucking great future you have left to save everyone who hates you.” 

Hartley doesn’t know how to deal with _this_ Barry Allen, the man now that reminds him of the kid he met in a leather suit on the streets of Central City and told him that he was interested in Hartley’s background of science, and could he maybe look up a certain death a decade ago. The man now that reminds him of the boy who would rob prestigious establishments for incentive on information on the one person he values above everyone else, the one person he believes in, the one person in his life who died. The man that Hartley had to go and fall in love with. 

“Well,” he swallows, “you’d better get to work then. We have less than five minutes left before everything blows.” 


	5. Chapter 5

xiv. 

They don’t talk, or at least Hartley doesn’t, and he can’t hear anything but the resounding, echoing beep of the spark - and what kind of spark did the Rogues place in order to set off a few hundred stashed sticks of dynamite? 

The spark would probably kill them before the dynamite did. 

Hartley pulls on the zip ties, string and duct tape the sticks of TNT are held together with and pulls the fuses out of the caps, ignoring the fact that his elbows have begun to shudder as well as his forearms, and the pulse in his forehead cannot be ignored as the beginnings of a drawn-out panic attack any longer. 

But panicking can be saved until after his bodily responses are nothing but pieces of ash floating in the noses of all the police officers evacuating the surrounding buildings, as slow as corporate organizations can be. 

Joe West is arguing with another officer, saying, “The Piper and the Flash are in STAR Labs with explosives? By _themselves_?” 

Hartley wants to scream out all of his secrets, because they’re going to die with him, and he’s spent too long and endured too much of a broken body for them to go to waste. 

However, Barry Allen, the subject of most of his secrets, is crouching next to him, snapping off fuses and turning the dynamite as useless as possible, considered. Hartley’s not going to deny him the chance to redeem himself as well, if he wants to pretend to die again. 

Police conversations bleed into the silence and the unnatural heartbeat of the timer, and with every tick Hartley’s mind runs in more circles around the thought that _he’s dying,_ even though he survived everything else. 

Of course, he’s dying _because_ he survived everything else, and the Flash is going to survive this because he can jump off the side of the building and run down if need be and Hartley _can’t_. All he can do is hear things and try to prevent the worst from happening. 

“I’m going to start throwing them off the window,” Hartley says, voice almost completely gone. So, on the upside, if he starts to shake and scream uncontrollably because he’s never learned how to properly control the attacks, no one will hear. 

“Warn them before you do,” Barry advises, “or they’ll start firing at you, never mind what will happen when they do.” 

“Fuck. Okay.” Hartley nods, dragging his unresponsive body to the window and amplifying his voice again. “Just a heads up, I’m going to drop the dynamite on the ground. It’s not lit.” 

A voice comes from the ground, sharp and terrified, “If you even _think_ of redirecting the Rogues’ attack on us, we will destroy you.” 

“They’re not _lit_ ,” Hartley scowls again. “If I don’t do this, we will _all_ die in about two minutes, so you’d better be fucking ready and not fire on me.” 

There’s no clear response, everyone talking over each other on the ground, so Hartley figures that’s a general _there’s no other choice worth taking_. 

He knocks another pane of glass out so he doesn’t accidentally slice himself, and begins to throw handfuls of the pile of unassuming sticks to the ground. Hartley can hear every single stick as they hit the ground or are caught by swift hands, and every smack against the pavement eases pain off his shoulders. 

At least he can die in peace. 

The beat of the timer returns to the forefront of his mind, almost a solid line of sound. “We’ve got thirty seconds left,” he says, and that’s not enough time to do or say anything accept for petty one-liners that Hartley has always meant, but he still has a job to do. 

Barry takes a look at the pile still bundled and fused, and he takes as many as he can. “If they blow up on the way down, it’s better than in here,” he says, and carries them to the window as well, letting them drop. “Fuck. We need to get rid of all of them.” 

“If they blow up on the way down, the CCPD will shoot us up,” Hartley hisses. 

“We have seconds, yeah?” Barry says. “Won’t make much of a difference.” 

Hartley takes as many as he can and hurries back to the window. “Fine. Fuck. Ten seconds. It’s a line of pain in my head, and I can’t hear anything else.” 

“Can you hear me?” Barry asks, and they’re both next to the blown-out window. 

“Barely,” Hartley shakes his head. 

Barry wraps his red leather arms around Hartley. “I’m so sorry,” he says. 

“There’s _still a few more on the desk_ ,” Hartley almost shouts. “Fuck you, Allen, I have to -” 

“There’s nothing else you can do,” Barry says, still enveloping the shuddering man. “What do you hear now?” 

“It’s a line, like a heartbeat monitor,” Hartley says. “You have to leave _now_.” 

“You have to hold on to me,” Barry says. 

“No.” Hartley shakes his head, sweat coating his cheeks. The noise cuts out suddenly, and it’s replaced with the click of a lighter, the click of the beginning of the end. “Go _now_!” 

“Not without you!” 

“Fuck you, Allen, I can’t do this!” Hartley screams. “I can’t run away, don’t you see? This is the only thing I’ve ever done that helped people, and if I can’t fucking finish it, then what does it make me?” 

“The same thing it makes me - _smart_ ,” Barry hisses. “Just _hold on_ to me!” 

Hartley whips his head around to see and smell the beginning of fire in the hallway. “Leave, just _leave_!” 

Barry looks at the fire licking at the desks and leftover pile of dynamite on the floor, fuses still attached. “It’ll have to work without your cooperation,” he says, and heaves the two of them out of the broken window, tucking Hartley into his chest so they roll down the side of the building. 

Hartley can’t scream, can’t cry, can’t do anything but close his eyes and forget to breathe. 

xv. 

Barry wakes up in a sterile bed in a hospital room, with a heartbeat monitor incessantly beeping as if to annoy him into consciousness. He opens his eyes and sees the unnerving fluorescent light of the ceiling, and breathes clean air not polluted by smoke. 

It’s a first, in a while. Even after he had left the orchestra hall and run to the most remote alley he could find, Barry couldn’t get the smell of smoke from his lungs. He couldn’t shy away from the overwhelming pain it reminded him of, the constant stabbing of his lungs that reminds him of _fire_. 

He’s free of the unwanted flashbacks to the casino and his apartment, but he has the memory of looking at the doorway to STAR Lab’s control room and seeing more of the same explosive material crawling at him, like it wanted to grab him and throttle him until his lightning was sucked out of him and all that was left in Barry’s head was silence of death. 

Someone’s calling his name, someone with a smoke-shot voice just like his own, with the pleading and the _urgency_ in it he remembers from his apartment’s explosion. 

Barry tries to scramble out of the hospital bed, but he’s handcuffed to the rail, and he gasps for air that won’t permeate his diaphragm as he looks into the stitched up face of Hartley Rathaway. 

“Fuck,” Barry breathes. “What am I doing here? What - what happened?” 

Hartley just smiles and wheezes out a laugh. “How about the part where you start hyperventilating, Allen? Concerned about _that_?” 

Barry pulls non responsive bony wrists from the shackles, the gray sheen that meant prison or death, the handcuffs that he knew, in theory, how to undo. 

“What’s happening?” Barry asks the Rathaway, who is breathing heavily as well, sweating like he’s been in a marathon and not in a hospital bed. 

“We’re alive,” Hartley says, lying back down against his pillow. He, too, is shackled to the frame, both hands incapacitated. “I didn’t pass out after you landed us abruptly, but you were _out_.” 

“I remember fire,” Barry breathes, attempting to regulate his heartbeat which is stuttering on the monitor next to him. “After we landed - did they hurt you?” 

“They took us to the fucking hospital, Allen, and proceeded to drill me with questions until the sun rose. You were out like a lamp and they couldn’t do anything to get you to wake up; your metabolism spit every drug they had out like a light. You’re healing, but last I heard you punctured your intestines, so I do _not_ recommend escaping alone.” 

“They know who I am,” Barry says, and it’s obvious, as he’s in a hospital gown and not in a mask. They probably took his suit off as soon as the two landed on the ground and the police swarmed them. He wonders what Joe thought of him, what Iris, what Eddie thought of him right now. 

“Yep,” Hartley says, closing his eyes in feigned casualty. “What do you plan on doing now?” 

“Healing,” Barry groaned. “I feel the damage in my body.” _It feels like I died._

Hartley smiles again. “That’s a good idea.” 

“And you?” 

The Piper shrugged, handcuffs clacking. “I might take a vacation to Keystone before returning to rule the crime of Central, I haven’t decided yet. You might want to know there are a few dozen police officers on every level of this building, and the only way we’re getting out is by a solid plan.” 

“I hope you don’t mean _me_ ; I don’t want to run any longer.” Barry gently lies himself back down on the stone of a bed, closing his eyes to feel the thrum of his internal organs, and the acute pain in his gut. Another scar he would have to live with, but _fuck_ , at least he’s still alive. 

It’s a lie; of course Barry wants to keep running. It’s the only thing he _can_ do with his powers and the situation on the streets. He just doesn’t want to run with _Hartley_ , and he’s known this since Hartley struggled for life on an orchestra seat. 

There’s a type of fear the blooms in Barry’s throat every night as he tries to sleep, the type that crawls up his windpipe and pulls on his brain until he screams. There’s another type of fear, less paralyzing than this but more helpless, of watching it happen to someone else. 

“I have to run by myself, you see,” Barry tries to explain, but Hartley’s already shaking his head. 

“It’s okay,” Hartley says, but Barry _knows_ he doesn’t feel it with the way he holds himself, like he’s on edge against Barry. “I know what you think of me.” 

Barry didn’t mean what he said in the orchestra hall, and he wants to scream _can’t you understand I’m not who you think I am?_

He had made a mistake. He had panicked, and it had gone so horribly wrong. It ended up with him making up his mind to tell the Precinct something about being out on the town when his apartment was blown up, but by then the video of _Eddie with a gun pressed to his head_ was on every TV screen in the city, and Barry had almost blacked out. 

He didn’t know why he went to STAR Labs still as a wanted person, because there was nothing that ‘Barry Allen, Forensic Analyst’ would be able to do. There was nothing that he could do in his state of fear pressing on him from all sides and surrounding his gut. 

Barry doesn’t want to remember this. 

Barry drags himself back to the present, to the shades of white painted on the walls that scream of death and smell of not-smoke, and he turns to Hartley again, who is still struggling to breathe calmly. 

Hartley smiles at him, all mouth movements. His eyes are still unmoving and haunted. “If you want to turn yourself in, be my guest, Allen,” he says. “If you want to tell the entire CCPD your history of thievery and why, exactly, you did what you did, then it’s completely up to you. I don’t give a shit.” 

“We both know you don’t mean that,” Barry surprises himself by responding. He wants to hug Hartley again, the embrace at the broken window the only part about the last few days Barry _wants_ to remember. 

“Don’t say that,” Hartley bites out in a whisper. “Don’t you _dare_ to know what I think or don’t think, because you never cared in the first place. Do you know what it’s like to be completely prepared to die, to be able to give up everything you have because you _have nothing left_?” 

“Of course I do,” Barry hisses back. “I was there, too. I made my decision as well.” 

“And we didn’t die,” Hartley motions at Barry’s stomach. “You have fourteen stitches on the right side of your stomach. I saw them stitch you up. You didn’t make a sound. You may have well been dead, and that monitor was the only reason I didn’t kill everyone in the room. You do understand I know you don’t care, or at least you _didn’t_ care when it mattered, and I made my decision to save you any way.” 

“What do you have against me going back to the CCPD? I’ve worked there for years,” Barry says. “Maybe they’ll give me more of a chance because I’ve fought against crime so much more than I committed it.” 

“Or they’ll just accuse you of all the unsolved cases that came across your desk that no one knew the clues to,” Hartley growls. “They’ll sentence you up for so many lifetimes and build a prison that you can’t get out of, no matter how fast you _run by yourself_. They don’t care that you were networking, that you were trying to be a hero by running around and understanding villains. Of course, they will drill you for everything you know about Central City’s crime, and use your knowledge to their advantage, with more trials and people in prisons that they will escape from. But _you_ will never be let go, because they know what you can do.” 

“How would you possibly know that?” Barry asks, indecision rising in his throat. A life of imprisonment, being left alone with his panic attacks and the unbidden memories that pop out at him when he isn’t doing anything else - he would die. 

Hartley scoffs. “I can hear the officers discussing you outside. Don’t worry, your boyfriend isn’t here, but I bet he’ll think the same thing, with all the money you’ve funneled away from people _it belongs to_ and to _whoever the fuck will tell you about lightning flashes_.” 

“They’re outside the door _now_?” 

“Don’t worry, they still think we’re both asleep. It’s only been ten hours since we crash landed.” 

“And there’s not a guard in here?” 

Hartley grins. “I may have pretended my hearing dampeners weren’t working until they agree to be outside the door so I didn’t combust, which is why there are so many backup officers around.” 

“But you’re still escaping,” Barry clarifies. 

“With or without your help, Allen.” Hartley raises a hand, and his handcuff dangles, unlatched. “Now, I believe you refused to help me, but I will ask again. Do you want to stay and face your boyfriend who hates you with his sad, small heart? Do you want to face the disappointment of your adopted family until the day you die? I bet Iris will talk about her on her channel. ‘So My Brother Is the Flash’ would propel her into fame, wouldn’t it?” 

“You don’t want me to help you after all I’ve done anyway,” Barry tries to spit, tries to muster up enough anger to counter Hartley’s pleading. 

Hartley turns away from him, neck clenching. “Of _course_ I want your help, Allen. You know this.” 

“No, I _don’t_. What I said about us being acquaintances was the only true thing I said in that hall. I’m not sure why you seem to think we’re something other than allies.” 

Hartley just closes his eyes and tries to curl his entire body away from Allen, working on the handcuffs on the other side of the bed. His hospital gown reveals the spine that sticks out against his back and the festering bruises and line of stitches that splatter it. 

“If you want to cancel our _partnership_ ,” Hartley says, “do it now. It’s almost the end of our guards’ shift, and the next will check on us. We’re either gone, or you’re not.” 

Barry’s truly curious about Hartley’s unchecked questions to his intentions, even though Barry’s said iterations on _no_ a few times by now. “You so desperately want my help,” he notes. 

“Don’t _mock_ me, Allen. You’re the only friend I have left, and I would prefer not to do this on my own. I can if you want to stay and face the axe, like I did before when you left me for dead.” 

“This time you’re leaving _me_ for dead,” Barry says. 

“And I _really don’t_ fucking want to,” Hartley turns to him, both handcuffs hanging off his wrists, attached to nothing. He stands up, smoothing his hospital gown at his knees. “I can barely see for shit, and my dampeners are on the fritz. I could collapse outside the hospital and this would all be for waste. We could both end up in much worse than Iron Heights, and we would both die alone and unloved. That’s why I’m asking, one last time, before the guards break down the doors. I hear the new shift walking down the hall, Allen, you need to pick _now_.” 

Barry thinks of Eddie and the last time he talked to him, when Eddie had been so angry and confused at the tabloid published as news, when Eddie had sounded so brokenhearted that Barry had fucked someone who wasn’t _him_. 

And now that it was something that Barry had actually done - being the Flash and committing petty crimes like he needed to steal to survive - Eddie would react with so much more anger, because it wasn’t just Eddie Barry had wronged since before he kissed him, it was _everyone_. Barry had wronged everyone, and there was no way to truly explain that. 

“Allen,” Hartley says, hands hovering over Barry’s handcuffed, melon-colored wrist. “Decide now.” 

“Fine.” Barry’s gaze snaps up to Hartley’s apprehensive figure, and the Rathaway immediately begins messing with the lock on the cuff. “You know that running away with me doesn’t mean you get what you want from me. You do know that, right?” 

Hartley looks at Barry, a tremor of apprehension running through him. “I know,” he says, guarded. “That’s _not_ why we should run together.” 

“Which is why we’re only _traveling_ together, but I’m still running by myself.” The distinction is so clear to him - Hartley hadn’t broken his trust, not more than usual, but Barry could still never trust him. 

“That’s also fine,” Hartley continues, freeing his other wrist and helping Barry stand. 

Barry’s side throbs in pain as he disconnects from the morphine drip, and he clutches his hip. He wards off Hartley, saying, “It will heal by itself.” 

“Yes, but I need you to get us out of the window _now_. They’re almost in the room.” 

Barry nods. “I can’t count how many times I’ve saved you this week,” he says. 

Hartley scoffs. “I’ll make it back to you at some point, Allen.” He voluntarily wraps his arms around Barry’s shoulders. “Now _run_.” 

xvi. 

Eddie’s motionless in the passenger seat of Joe’s car, watching the reflections of the sirens bounce off the windshield. He’s not technically supposed to be here, in front of the hospital, since his abduction and almost execution, but he was present when the EMTs peeled the Flash’s mask off of Barry Allen’s unconscious and bleeding face, and then cut off the Flash’s outfit from his broken body. 

All that runs through Eddie’s mind is seeing Barry, pale and naked, on the gurney in the back of a rattling ambulance. He remembers the EMT applying pressure over a puncture wound of a shard of glass stabbing Barry through the back, seeing Barry’s blood over their gloves and gauze. “He’s bleeding profusely internally,” one EMT said, and another radioed the hospital to set up a CT scan as soon as the surgery was finished. 

Joe was sitting next to him, silent, and Eddie was still shaking and can still feel where the barrel of the gun was pressed into his head. Eddie can’t do anything but shudder and remember Barry’s face, bruised and calm against all odds. Hartley Rathaway is in another ambulance, and Eddie can’t bring himself to care for the Piper. 

But _fuck_ , his boyfriend is the Flash, and that’s something Eddie still can’t understand, fully. Barry Allen, who blushed at the slightest of Eddie’s touches and wore a hoodie everywhere he went lest he caught a cold, who treated crimes by the Flash with the same attitude to all the other perps, who screamed at him that Hartley was a _friend_ with such conviction, is the Flash. 

Eddie listens to the police radio now as Joe sits in and watches the surgery on Barry to fix the internal damage to his intestines. The glass had missed his organs, Joe said with palpable relief, and Eddie hadn’t started to cry until he reached the safety of an empty car. 

There are no more tears that can come out of his eyes, nothing left to visibly display his grief at the level of _wrong_ that had just been revealed, the veil that had been ripped away from hyper, anxious, shy Barry Allen to - whatever he was now. Someone that saved people from burning buildings while executing heists for millions of dollars and showed up to work directly after it, like he had all the time in the world. 

Eddie doesn’t know what to do, hasn’t since the Precinct blew to pieces and true chaos started. He thinks maybe, when Barry wakes up, he can tell Eddie why he didn’t fuck Hartley but committed crimes the day before interrupting a fight between him and Leonard Snart. 

Eddie thinks that maybe he could tell Barry everything he didn’t get to tell him: that he was _so fucking sorry_ for all the misunderstandings, for the police leaving him and Hartley to die in STAR Labs. 

He thinks maybe he can tell Barry he loves him. Maybe he can sit in the interrogation room like with every other petty thief he’s interviewed, watch Barry being led in, cuffed and breaking out in all the bruises necessary, considering a fall from that height. He can ask Barry perfunctorily what crimes he committed and why, and then maybe just tell him he’s _so sorry_. 

Maybe Eddie can even tell him more than just that, before the officers take him back to a holding cell before he’s transferred to Iron Heights, or somewhere that would keep a man with superhuman speed. Maybe Eddie can tell him why _he_ did what he did, if Barry gives him the same courtesy. 

Maybe Eddie can win back Barry’s trust, if he ever learns how to trust Barry again. 

Eddie’s holding his walkie talkie in his hand as tightly as possible, squeezing the microphone. He takes a few deep breaths, collecting himself, because he’s still in a cop car and even if he isn’t in uniform, his face was plastered on everyone’s phones hours ago. 

He can’t afford to collapse. 

As he watches the hospital, a red streak alerts his gaze, from the third floor window and dropping to the ground, then racing past the parking lot and out to the rest of the world. 

Eddie’s raising the walkie talkie to his lips before he consciously processes it. “This is Detective Thawne,” he says. “I saw Allen run down the side of the building and out.” 

His sentiment is repeated by the new shift of guards outside Allen and Rathaway’s hospital room. “They’re gone,” one breathes into the mic. 

“No shit,” Eddie says, and his heartbeat is surprisingly steady. “I _just said that_.” 

Joe clicks on his mic. “Everyone, stand down. The Flash can move up to the speed of sound, and there’s no way we can chase him. Someone get me in contact with Mercury Labs and tell them to find a way to track super speed down.” 

Eddie clicks his mic. “I’ll do it,” he says. 

“No way in hell you’re doing anything in your condition, Thawne,” Captain Singh says. “Rest and recover. I’ll find Mercury.” 

Eddie tosses his walkie talkie into the back of the car. 

Barry’s running away with _Hartley Rathaway_ , destroying any and all connections with the CCPD, and Eddie is stuck in recovery. 

The chances of Eddie saying anything to Barry again are impossible - unless, of course, he joins the effort in tracking down the Flash, even during his recovery. 

Eddie stretches his arms experimentally, and feels the pull of strained muscles. He’s up for a chase. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was definitely one of my more enjoyable Camp NaNo projects and I'm so glad I got to share it with the Internet.

**Author's Note:**

> please keep me company at my [tumblr](http://www.tylerjosephstoast.tumblr.com)


End file.
